and sold." The part of sec. 869b with which we are concerned reads as follows: "Any person who makes or offers to make any contract defined in the preceding section, or who is the keeper of any bucket shop, shall, upon conviction thereof, be punished by a fine not exceeding one thousand dollars or by imprisonment for not more than one year. Any person who shall be convicted of a second offense shall be punished by imprisonment for not more than five years."

The learned trial justice ruled that while the heading of the act "undoubtedly indicates a purpose which Congress declares itself about to execute," that purpose was not carried into effect; that only two classes of persons are penalized, those who make any contract defined in the 1st section and those who are the keepers of any bucket shop; that the word "contract," as defined in the 1st section, means any agreement, trade, or transaction, and that, inasmuch as the 2d section purports to penalize indiscriminately the making of contracts, the act is void. The court further held "that the phraseology of the section which penalizes 'contracts' permits them no constitutional operation: therefore, no contracts being prohibited by a valid legislative enactment, there can be no operation for that clause of 869a which defines 'bucket shop' as any 'place where any contract prohibited by this act is made;' consequently it is no offense to be the keeper of such place."

Penal statutes, like all others, are the embodiment of legislative will in concrete form, and constitute a rule of conduct for the guidance and control of the individual. If the form employed be intelligible to the ordinary individual, the prime requisite of the statute is met; in other words, if the ordinary individual, after reading the statute, knows exactly what he may and may not do, its meaning cannot be said to be ambiguous. If such a statute be within the scope of legislative authority, it is the plain duty of the court to sustain and enforce it.

As previously stated, this act is found in the subchapter of the Code dealing with offenses against public policy, and the declared purpose and scope of the act is to prohibit bucketing and bucket shopping, that is, a specified kind of gambling con

tracts, and to abolish bucket shops, that is, places where such inhibited contracts are made or offered to be made. After this declaration as to the scope and purpose of the act, it is provided that certain words and phrases used therein "shall, unless a different meaning is plainly required by the context," have certain meanings. The word "contract," it is provided, shall include "any agreement, trade, or transaction." Bucket shop, it is provided, shall cover any room, office, store, building, or other place, not where any contract is made or offered to be made, but "where any contract prohibited by this act is made or offered to be made." "Keeper" is then ordained to mean or include "any person owning, keeping, managing, operating, or promoting a bucket shop" or assisting therein. In the next and last paragraph of the section, bucketing and bucket shopping, the particular species of gambling contracts which the act was designed to prohibit, are fully and clearly defined. The next section of the act, sec. 869b, ordains that any person who makes or offers to make "any contract defined in the preceding section, or who is the keeper of any bucket shop," shall, upon conviction, be punished. In holding that the word "contract," as thus used in sec. 869b, embraces all agreements, trades, or transactions, the learned trial justice has necessarily entirely disregarded the declared purpose and object of the act. It was not only necessary to do this in thus enlarging the operation of sec. 869b, but it was also necessary entirely to disregard almost all the provisions of the preceding section. In our view, such an interpretation of the act is violative of well-settled principles of statutory construction. In the first place, we are not at liberty to disregard the declared purpose of a criminal statute, nor are we at liberty to disregard any part of its connected structure. On the contrary, we must have in mind the legislative intent, the evils sought to be overcome, and, if possible, give force and effect to every part of the connected structure. United States v. Corbett, 215 U. S. 233, 59 L. ed. 173, 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 81; District of Columbia v. Dewalt, 31 App. D. C. 331. And where general words are employed, their meaning should be restricted to the obvious scope of the statute.

United States v. Palmer, 3 Wheat. 610, 4 L. ed. 471; Church of the Holy Trinity v. United States, 143 U. S. 457, 36 L. ed. 226, 12 Sup. Ct. Rep. 571; United States v. Kirby, 7 Wall. 482, 19 L. ed. 278; Petri v. Commercial Nat. Bank, 142 U. S. 644, 35 L. ed. 1144, 12 Sup. Ct. Rep. 325.

Considering the act before us as a connected structure, it is apparent that the words "any contract defined in the preceding section," as used in its 2d section, refer not to all contracts, but to the particular kind of contracts theretofore described, namely, bucketing and bucket-shopping contracts. Any other construction necessarily frustrates the obvious legislative intent, and is reached only by wresting one clause of the 1st section from its context. Regarding that section, as above suggested, as one harmonious whole, and giving to the words therein employed the intent and meaning clearly in the mind of the legislature, we reach a reasonable and consistent result. It must be presumed that the framers of the act fully understood that they were without authority to prohibit the making of all contracts. Indeed, they have furnished us, in the very first words of the act, with indubitable evidence upon this point, for there they have declared its purpose, and its sole purpose. Evidently intending that the particular contracts at which the act was aimed, and which were thereafter to be fully defined or described, should include and embrace all "agreements, trades, or transactions" relating to the same subject-matter, Congress at the outset in effect declared that the word "contract," as thereafter used, should be synonymous with "agreement, trade, or transaction." The definition of a bucket shop clearly indicates that a particular kind of contract only was in mind, for in this definition we find the words "any contract prohibited by this act." When, therefore, Congress used the words in the 2d section, "any contract defined in the preceding section," those words were intended to refer, and did in fact refer, to bucketing and bucket-shopping contracts, or to "agreements, trades, or transactions" relating thereto.

Had we been disposed to hold that the word "contract," as used in the 2d section of the act, embraced any agreement, trade,

or transaction, we would have been met by the provision in the first paragraph of the 1st section of the act, to the effect that the words and phrases thereafter used shall have certain meanings, "unless a different meaning is plainly required by the context." This declaration on the part of Congress is a mere repetition of a well-recognized canon of interpretation. The words "defined in the preceding section," as used in the 2d section of the act, refer to that entire section, and not merely to one of its clauses. That entire section was aimed at bucketing and bucket-shopping contracts, and the nature and essential characteristics of such contracts are therein set forth. Again, the 2d section of the act does not purport to penalize all contracts. It merely punishes the making of "any contract defined in the preceding section," or, as we have endeavored to demonstrate, bucketing contracts.

But, it is said, even assuming that bucketing contracts only are penalized, the act is still unconstitutional. The contention is that the intention of the keeper determines the lawfulness of the contract, and that under the terms of the act an innocent party may be penalized. Without intimating any opinion as to whether good faith on the part of a person dealing with the keeper of a bucket shop would, under the terms of the act, constitute a good defense to a charge against him for a violation of its provisions, we may quite easily dispose of this contention. The act is aimed primarily at bucket shops. It would hardly be denied that it was quite competent for Congress to have penalized merely the keeping of a bucket shop and the making of bucketing contracts by the keeper thereof. Indeed, in many of the states this has been done. It is therefore apparent that, had Congress not undertaken in any manner to punish the party dealing with the bucket shop keeper, it would nevertheless have enacted the other provisions of the law, for in so doing it would have abolished bucket shops and bucketing. The provisions of the act defining a bucket shop, and prohibiting the keeper thereof from making bucketing contracts, being entirely separable from and in nowise dependent upon the provisions relating to the other

parties to such contracts, we are not now concerned with those other provisions, since, as we have said, it is apparent that, regardless of those provisions, Congress would have enacted those which we have found to be free from defect. Hyde v. Southern R. Co. 31 App. D. C. 466; El Paso & N. E. R. Co. v. Gutierrez, 215 U. S. 87, 54 L. ed. 106, 30 Sup. Ct. Rep. 21.

The judgment must be reversed, and the cause remanded for further proceedings. Reversed and remanded.

UNITED STATES v. CELLA.

CRIMINAL LAW; PARTIES; STATUTES; BUCKET SHOPS.

1. There can be no crimes against the District of Columbia, the District not being a sovereignty; but crimes committed in the District of Columbia are crimes against the United States. (Following United States v. Cella, ante, 423.)

2. Under sec. 932, D. C. Code [31 Stat. at L. 1340, chap. 854], prosecutions in the District of Columbia for violations of general penal statutes should be in the name of the United States, and not in the name of the District of Columbia, even though the territorial scope of such statutes may be restricted to the District of Columbia.

3. A prosecution for the violation of a statute prohibiting the business of bucketing in this District should be in the name of the United States, and not of the District of Columbia, whether the prosecution is for the first or second offense. (Construing sec. 932, D. C. Code.)

No. 2314. Submitted October 3, 1911. Decided November 6, 1911.

HEARING on an appeal by the United States from a judgment of the Supreme Court of the District of Columbia sustaining demurrers to an indictment for criminal conspiracy, and quashing the indictment. Reversed.

The facts are stated in the opinion.

Vol. XXXVII.-28.