Ex parte Cohen

While Louis Steinberger was under examination before the Hon. W. T. Wallace, one of the judges of the superior court of San Francisco, sitting as a committing magistrate, in which said Steinberger was charged with a felony in “ having willfully caused, procured, and allowed one Louis Cohen to be registered *526 upon the precinct register of the first precinct of the forty-third assembly district of the state of California in the city and county of San Francisco, state of California, knowing said Louis Cohen not to be entitled to such registration,” the petitioner was called as a witness on the part of the people, and, having been sworn as such witness, was asked the following questions, viz:

The witness refused to answer each of these questions as they were propounded to him, on the ground that his answer might incriminate him, whereupon the judge stated to him: “ It is a legal impossibility in this case to expose yourself by your testimony here. I instruct you that you are bound to answer. You must answer.” But, notwithstanding such direction, the witness still refused to answer, and was thereupon adjudged guilty of contempt, and ordered to be imprisoned in the common jail of…