claims. When a duty is enjoined upon him by the law of his office and not merely by the request of a Department, he is bound to perform it and take as compensation what the law gives him. That is his contract; and if it be a bad one for him he has no remedy but resignation. The subject is not open to a new bargain between him and any other officer of the Government. All criminal prosecutions and all civil suits in which the United States are a party of record fall within this principle. In them no charge for extra services can be legally allowed, though it be true that some of them require an amount of labor and skill for which the compensation allowed by the fee-bill is altogether inadequate. I cannot make out, in any way satisfactory to my own mind, the ingenious distinction which would pay the officer as attorney what the fee-bill gives, and then pay him besides a quantum meruit for managing the same case as counsel." 9 Op. 146, 147.

In an opinion rendered March 13, 1888, Attorney General Garland, upon an extended review of the adjudged cases, said: "From these authorities it may be derived that the elements necessary to justify the payment of compensation to an officer for additional services are, that they shall be performed by virtue of a separate and distinct appointment authorized by law; that such services shall not be services added to or connected with the regular duties of the place he holds; and that a compensation, whose amount is fixed by law or regulation, shall be provided for their payment." 19 Op. 121, 125, 126.

The same views were expressed by the Second Comptroller of the Treasury in an opinion delivered by him as late as 1893 in Earhart's case. Cousar's Dig. 12.

We are of opinion that Congress intended by sections 1764 and 1765 to uproot the practice under which, in the absence of any statute expressly authorizing it, extra allowances or special compensation were made to public officers for services which they were required to render in consideration only of the fixed salary and emoluments established for them by law. Our duty is to give effect to the legislation of Congress, and not to defeat it by an interpretation plainly inconsistent with the words used.

Syllabus.

The conclusion is that as the defendant in error was under a duty as District Attorney to represent the United States in the condemnation proceedings referred to (§ 771); as his attendance in court on those proceedings was on the business of the United States (§ 824); as no statute provides for extra or special compensation for services of that character; and as the existing statutes declare that no officer in any branch of the public service shall directly or indirectly, or in any form whatever, receive from the Treasury, of the United States any additional pay, extra allowance or compensation, unless the same be authorized by law and the appropriation therefor expressly states that it is for such additional pay, extra allowance or compensation, Rev. Stat. §§ 1764, 1765, act of June 20, 1874, c. 328, the claim of the defendant in error must be rejected, and judgment rendered for the United States.

For the reasons stated the first question is answered in the negative; and under the certificate the answer to the other questions becomes both unnecessary and immaterial. It will be so certified.

MR. JUSTICE SHIRAS and MR. JUSTICE PECKHAM dissented.

UNITED STATES v. MATTHEWS.

APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF CLAIMS.

No. 79. Argued December 8, 1898. Decided March 6, 1899.

The authority conferred upon the Attorney General by the act of March 3, 1891, c. 542, 26 Stat. 985, to offer rewards for the detection and prosecution of crimes against the United States, preliminary to the indictment, empowered him to authorize the marshal of the Northern District of Florida to offer a reward for the arrest and delivery of a person accused of the committal of a crime against the United States in that district, the reward to be paid upon conviction; and a deputy marshal, who had complied with all the conditions of the offer and of the statute, was entitled to receive the amount of the reward offered.

Opinion of the Court.

THE case is stated in the opinion.

Mr. Assistant Attorney General Pradt for appellants. Mr. John G. Capers was on his brief.

Mr. Richard R. McMahon and Mr. George A. King for appellees.

MR. JUSTICE WHITE delivered the opinion of the court.

The court below held that the plaintiffs were entitled to recover the sum by them claimed, 32 C. Cl. 123, and the United States prosecutes this appeal. The origin of the controversy and the facts upon which the legal conclusion of the court was rested are these: The two plaintiffs were, one a regular and the other a specially appointed deputy marshal. They claimed five hundred dollars, the sum of a reward offered by the Attorney General for the arrest and conviction of one Asa McNeil, who was accused of having been concerned in the killing of one or more revenue officers at a village in Holmes County, Florida. McNeil was arrested by the officers in question, tried and convicted. This suit was brought in consequence of a refusal to pay the reward. The act of March 3, 1891, c. 542, 26 Stat. 948, 985, "making appropriations for sundry civil expenses of the government for the fiscal year ending June the thirtieth, eighteen hundred and ninety-two, and for other purposes,' under the heading "Miscellaneous," contained the following appropriation: "Prosecution of crimes; for the detection and prosecution of crimes against the United States, preliminary to indictment . . under the direction of the Attorney General, .. thirty-five thousand dollars." Under the authority thus conferred the Attorney General, on July 31, 1891, addressed a letter to the marshal of the Northern District of Florida, saying: "Your letter of July 24 is received. You are authorized to offer a reward of five hundred dollars (500) for the arrest and delivery to you, at Jacksonville, of Asa McNeil, chief of conspirators, who fired upon revenue deputies at Bonifay, Holmes County, last fall, this reward

Opinion of the Court.

to be paid upon conviction of said McNeil." A capias for the arrest of McNeil was executed by the deputies in question on the 11th day of July, 1892, the court below finding that the arrest was due to their exertions.

Beyond doubt the appropriation empowered the Attorney General to make the offer of reward, and hence in doing so he exercised a lawful discretion vested in him by Congress. It is also clear that the offer of the reward made by the Attorney General was broad enough to embrace an arrest made by the deputies in question. If then the right to recover is to be tested by the provisions of the statute and by the language of the offer of reward, the judgment below was correctly rendered. The United States, however, relies for reversal solely on two propositions, which it is argued are both well founded. First. That as at common law it was against public policy to allow an officer to receive a reward for the performance of a duty which he was required by law to perform, therefore the statute conferring power on the Attorney General and the offer made by him in virtue of the discretion in him vested, should be so construed as to exclude the right of the deputies in question to recover, since as deputy marshals an obligation was upon them to make the arrest without regard to the reward offered. Second. That even although it be conceded that the officers in question were otherwise entitled to recover the reward, they were without capacity to do so because of the general statutory provision forbidding "officers in any branch of the public service or any other person whose salary, pay or emoluments are fixed by law or regulations," from receiving "any additional pay, extra allowance or compensation in any form whatever," (Rev. Stat. § 1765,) and because of the further provision "that no civil officer of the government shall hereafter receive any compensation or perquisites, directly or indirectly, from the Treasury or property of the United States beyond his salary or compensation allowed by law. . . Act of June 20, 1874, c. 328, 18 Stat. 85, 109. The first of these contentions amounts simply to saying that though the act of Congress vested the amplest discretion on the subject

Opinion of the Court.

in the Attorney General, and although that discretion was by him exercised without qualification or restriction, it becomes a matter of judicial duty in construing the statute and in interpreting the authority exercised under it to disregard both the obvious meaning of the statute and the general language of the authority exercised under it by reading into the statute a qualification which it does not contain and by inserting in the offer of reward a restriction not mentioned in it, the argument being that this should be done under the assumption that it is within the province of a court to disregard a statute upon the theory that the power which it confers is contrary to public policy. It cannot be doubted that in exercising the powers conferred on him by the statute, the Attorney General could at his discretion have confined the reward offered by him to particular classes of persons. To invoke, however, judicial authority to insert such restriction in the offer of reward when it is not there found, is to ask the judicial power to exert a discretion not vested in it, but which has been lodged by the lawmaking power in a different branch of the Government. Aside from these considerations the contention as to the existence of a supposed public policy, as applied to the question in hand, is without foundation in reason and wanting in support of authority.

It is undoubted that both in England and in this country it has been held that it is contrary to public policy to enforce in a court of law, in favor of a public officer, whose duty by virtue of his employment required the doing of a particular act, any agreement or contract made by the officer with a private individual, stipulating that the officer should receive an extra compensation or reward for the doing of such act. An agreement of this character was considered at common law to be a species of quasi extortion, and partaking of the character of a bribe. Bridge v. Cage, Cro. Jac. 103; Badow v. Salter, Sir Wm. Jones, 65; Stotesbury v. Smith, 2 Burr. 924; Hatch v. Mann, 15 Wend. 44; Gillmore v. Lewis, 12 Ohio, 281; Stacy v. State Bank of Illinois, 4 Scam. 91; Davies v. Burns, 5 Allen, 349; Brown v. Godfrey, 33 Vt. 120; Morrell v. Quarles, 35 Ala. 544; Day v. Putnam Ins. Co., 16