Opinion of the Court.

contention of the appellee could not be sustained; but in order that the question might be brought to this court and finally settled, rendered a judgment pro forma in his favor for $862.22, from which the United States have appealed.

Mr. Solicitor-General Phillips for the United States.

Mr. J. Thomas Turner and Mr. Theodore H. N. McPherson for the appellee.

MR. JUSTICE WOODS delivered the opinion of the court.

The act of June 17th, 1870, entitled "An Act to regulate the salaries of chief justices and associate justices in the Territories," 16 Stat. 152; Rev. St. § 1879, provided as follows:

"The salaries of the chief justices and associate justices of the Territories of New Mexico, Washington, Wyoming, etc., shall be three thousand dollars each per annum."

This statute remaining in force, Congress, on March 3d, 1877, passed an act entitled "An Act making appropriations for the legislative, executive and judicial expenses of the government for the year ending June 30th, 1878, and for other purposes." 19 Stat. 294. This act declared as follows:

"That the following sums be and the same are hereby appropriated out of any money in the treasury not otherwise appropriated, in full compensation for the service of the fiscal year ending June 30th, 1878, for the objects hereinafter expressed.

"Territory of Wyoming. For salaries of governor, chief justice and two associate judges, at two thousand six hundred dollars each."

The act of June 19th, 1878, making appropriations for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 1879, contained similar provisions in the same language. 20 Stat. 178, 194. The act of June 21st, 1879, 21 Stat. 23, making appropriations for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 1880, appropriated "the same sums of money

Opinion of the Court.

and for like purpose (and continuing the same provisions relating thereto) as were appropriated for the fiscal year ending June 30th, 1879," by the act above referred to making appropriations for that year. With the exception of the words "in full compensation," the opening clause of these acts is substantially the same as that used in all other appropriation acts of every description since the foundation of the government.

Upon this state of the statute law the question is presented whether from June 30th, 1877, up to and including November 26th, 1879, the appellee was entitled to a salary at the rate of $3,000 per annum, or at the rate of $2,600 per annum. The contention of appellee is that under the act of June 17th, 1870, he was entitled to a salary of $3,000, notwithstanding the subsequent legislation above referred to.

We cannot concur in this view. The act of June 17th, 1880, fixing the annual salary of appellee at $3,000, was not a contract that the salary should not be reduced during his term of office. Butler v. Pennsylvania, 10 How. 402. Nor was there any provision of the Constitution which forbade a reduction. Clinton v. Engelbrecht, 13 Wall. 434.

Congress therefore could, without the violation of any contract, reduce the salary of appellee, and had the constitutional power to do so.

Certain well-settled rules of interpretation are applicable to this case. One is that a legislative act is to be interpreted according to the intention of the legislation apparent upon its face, Wilkinson v. Leland, 2 Pet. 627; another, that, if possible, effect must be given to every clause, section, and word of the statute, Bacon's Abr. Statute, I. 2; Powlter's Case, 11 Coke, 29a, 34a; Potter's Dwarris, 194; Opinion of the Justices, 22 Pick. 571; and a third, that where two acts are in irreconcilable conflict the later repeals the earlier act, even though there be no express repeal. McCool v. Smith, 1 Black, 459; United States v. Tynen, 11 Wall. 88; Red Rock v. Henry, 106 U. S. 596; United States v. Inim, 5 McLean, 178; West v. Pine, 4 Wash. 691; Britton v. Commonwealth, 1 Cush. 302.

Applying these rules, we think that the appropriation acts above referred to, so far as they concern the question in hand,

VOL. CIX-10

Syllabus.

are susceptible of but one meaning. Placing side by side the two clauses of the statute which relate to this controversy, their plain effect is to appropriate $2,600 for the salary of the appellee for one year, and to declare that the sum so appropriated shall be in full compensation for his services as chief justice for the year specified. There is no ambiguity and no room for construction.

We cannot adopt the view of appellee unless we eliminate from the statute the words " in full compensation," which Congress, abandoning the long-used form of the appropriation acts has, ex industria, inserted. Our duty is to give them effect. When Congress has said that the sum appropriated shall be in full compensation of the services of the appellee, we cannot say that it shall not be in full compensation, and allow him a greater sum.

Not only do the words of the statute make the intention of Congress manifest, but that intention is plainly repugnant to the former statute, which fixes the yearly salary of the chief justice at $3,000. It is impossible that both acts should stand. No ingenuity can reconcile them. The later act must therefore prevail, and the earlier act must for the time covered by the appropriation acts above referred to be considered as suspended. The result of these views is that the judgment of the court of claims, which gives the appellant a salary at the rate of $3,000 per annum from June 30th, 1877, to November 26th, 1879, must be reversed, and

The case remanded to the court of claims with directions to dismiss the petition.

UNITED STATES v. MITCHELL.

APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF CLAIMS.

Submitted March 30th, 1883.-Decided November 5th, 1883.

Interpreter-Salary-Statute.

The Revised Statutes fix the annual salary of an interpreter at four hundred dollars. In 1877 Congress appropriated in gross for such offices "at three

Statement of Facts.

hundred dollars per annum," and repeated the appropriation in like form down to and including the appropriation act of March 3d, 1881. A served as such interpreter from July, 1878, to November, 1882, and was paid at the rate of $300 per annum. In a suit to recover at the rate fixed by the Revised Statutes : Held, that Congress had expressed its purpose to reduce for the time being the salaries of interpreters, and that the claimant could not recover.

This was a suit by the appellee, Charles Mitchell, to recover a balance which he claimed to be due him as Indian interpreter at the Santee agency in the State of Nebraska, under section 2070, title XXIII., of the Revised Statutes.

That section, and section 2076, which constitutes part of the same title, and also relates to the compensation of interpreters, are as follows:

SEC. 2070. "The salaries of interpreters lawfully employed in the service of the United States in Oregon, Utah, and New Mexico, shall be five hundred dollars a year each, and of all so employed elsewhere, four hundred dollars a year each.”

SEC. 2076. "The several compensations prescribed by this title shall be in full of all emoluments and allowances whatsoever."

It appeared from the findings of the court of claims that the appellee was an interpreter at the Santee Indian agency in the State of Nebraska, duly appointed under section 2068 of the Revised Statutes, and that he held the office and discharged its duties for several periods between July 1st, 1878, and November 22d, 1882, his whole term of service amounting to three years and seven months.

During all this time, instead of the salary of $400 per annum, as provided in section 2070, he was paid only at the rate of $300 per annum, for which he gave a receipt in full for his services, Congress having appropriated that sum only for his yearly compensation during his term of service.

The appellee, contending that he was entitled to a salary at the rate of $400 per annum, brought this suit to recover the difference between his salary at that rate and the sum which he was actually paid. The court of claims rendered judgment in his favor for $353.33; from which the United States appealed.

Opinion of the Court.

Mr. Assistant-Attorney-General Simons and Mr. John S. Blair for the United States.

Mr. George A. King for the appellee.

MR. JUSTICE WOODS delivered the opinion of the court. It is contended on behalf of the United States that, by the appropriation acts which cover the period for which the appellee claims compensation, Congress expressed its purpose to suspend the operation of section 2070 of the Revised Statutes, and to reduce for that period the salaries of the appellee and other interpreters of the same class from $400 to $300 per We think this contention is well founded.

annum.

The law fixing the salaries of interpreters, as found in section 2070 of the Revised Statutes, was first passed in the Indian appropriation act of February 27, 1851, 9 Stat. 587. That act appropriated a gross sum for the pay of interpreters authorized by the act of June 30, 1834, 9 Stat. 735, and declared that the salaries of interpreters employed in certain named Territories should be $500, and in all others $400 per annum. From the passage of that act down to the passage of the Indian appropriation act of March 3, 1877, 19 Stat. 271, the appropriations for the salaries of interpreters were made at those rates. The act last mentioned specifically appropriated for the pay of Indian interpreters the uniform sum of $300 each. This course of legislation was continued for five consecutive years, until the passage of the Indian appropriation act of May 17, 1882, 22 Stat. 68, which appropriated the gross sum of $20,000 for the payment of necessary interpreters, to be distributed in the discretion of the Secretary of the Interior, and repealed section 2070 of the Revised Statutes. A like appropriation was made in the same terms by the Indian appropriation act of March 1, 1883. 22 Stat. 433.

An examination of this legislation, especially of the Indian appropriation acts, beginning with that of March 3, 1877, down to and including the act of March 3, 1881, which are all similar in their provisions, will clearly reveal the purpose of Congress. The act of March 3, 1877, opens with this provision:

"That the following sums be, and they are hereby appropri