208
rEDERAL REPORTER
nies. Rev. St. 5414, 5457, 5464; 19 St.' 223. - And this demo onstrates that the legislative will no longer declares this offence a felony, and we think the felony feature is impliedly repealed. It is argued very earnestly, however, that the effect of this is only to leave it a felony as at common la,w. We have already shown that under our system there is no common·law felony unless congress merely defines a crime which is a felony at common law by its common-law name. If the act said "counterfeiting" shall be punished as prescribed, it would be a felony; but it does not say so; it defines the offence for itself, and does not declare it a felony for the obvious reason that such a declaration would not change the character of the crime or the punishment, and would be wholly useless. Besides, it would be absurd to punish the misdemeanors of uttering and passing counterfeit coin with ' precisely the same punishment, all defined in the same section, and then say it was the intention of congress to give a defendant charged with making the counterfeit ten and another defendant who passed it only three, while both offences are defined and punished by the same section and with the same punishment. There is no substantial reason for such a distinction. One crime is just as heinous as the other in the sense of this statute, and are upon an equal footing. It is ruled that the defendant can have but three chal. lenges.
In L
'1'6 MARTIN,
Bankrupt.
(DiBtrict Oourt, W. D. Penn81jZ1Jar.ia. October 18, 1880.)
l!ECHAlUo'8
LIEN __ COMPUTATIPN OF TIME. - In computing the six months within which a mechapic's lien can be tiled, under the statutes of Pennsylvania, (purd. Dig. 1034, pIa. 44, 46,) either the day on which the last work is done, or the day on which the claim is moo, must be excluded.
Sur exceptions to the report of the oommissioner distributmgproeeeda of real utate.
IN BE MARTIN.
i09
.210 which the claim is filed, must be excluded. Therefore, the claim here, filed April 5, 1875, was in time. This construction of the mechanics' lien law is in accord with all the later. authorities upon the vexed question of the .computation of time. Cromelien v. Brink, 29 Po.. St. 524. Thus it was decided in Green's Appeal, 6 W. & S. 327, that under the act of the twenty-sixth of March, 1827, the five years from the day of the entry'of a judgment within which it must be revived by scire facias, are exclusive of the day on which the judgment was entered. And in Menges v. Frick, 73 Po.. St. 137, it was held that where a debt was due October 6, 1862, suit brought October 6, 1868, was in time to .escape the bar of the statute of limitations. "Time is to be .computed excluding the day on which the act is done from which the count is made," is the rule as expressed in Brisben . v. Wilson, 60 Po.. St. 452. As respects it seems to me the commissioner has made all proper allowances, and correctly reports the balance {lne on this lien. And now, October 18, 1880, the exceptions to the commissioner's report are overruled, and said report, and the distribution therein made, confirmed absolutely.
VOYLES,
Assignee, v;
PARKER.
(Circuit Court, D. Indiana.
--'-,1880.),