ments in satisfaction of claims, is, to say the least, irregular, and imposes responsibility where it does not properly belong." Mr. Clayton, Sec. of State, to Mr. Shields, May 19, 1849, MS. Inst. "In revising Wharton's Digest you may care to have the result of my 66 “The impression created by the extract printed in Dr. Wharton's Digest is that this practice was inaugurated in 1849 by Mr. Clayton and continued. 64 As a matter of fact Mr. Shields was authorized by instruction of October 15, 1849, to pay moneys received and to be received from the Venezuelan Government in a certain case to the assignees of the claimants, who were then in Venezuela, and Mr. Shields reports in his last dispatch, dated January 6th, 1850, that the receipt for this payment as well as the receipts for payments to the parties interested of the amounts realized in all the other cases of indemnity brought to a close during my term of service, are left on file in the archives of the legation.' “On February 28th, 1852, the Department instructed Mr. Steele, who was Mr. Shields' successor, to remit to the attorney of the claimant in the case of the Constancia any money which he might receive from the Venezuelan Government on account of the claim in that case. Throughout the correspondence, during Mr. Webster's and Mr. Cass's administrations (and also Mr. Marcy's), it is made clear that the practice of paying by diplomatic agents directly to claimants on foreign governments of moneys recovered from such governments in satisfaction of claims was approved. "I have not learned when this practice was changed by the Department, but I am satisfied that Mr. Clayton's plan of having the proceeds of foreign claims forwarded to the Treasury Department, as set forth in his instructions to Mr. Shields, was never insisted upon; indeed, it was wholly impracticable. Having been received at the Treasury, such moneys could not have been distributed to the parties in interest without an appropriation by Congress." (Letter of E. I. Renick, sometime chief clerk of the Department of State, to Mr. Moore, Assist. Sec. of State, May 27, 1898, MS.) A minister who collects from a foreign government, under instructions from his government, a sum due a citizen of the United States, is not entitled to make any charge for expenses of collection, even though he act at the time under a power of attorney from the claimant. Mr. Marcy, Sec. of State, to Mr. Peden, Apr. 10, 1856, MS. Inst. Arg. "I have received your No. 149, of the 5th instant, from which it appears that the National Bank of Hayti refuses to pay the second installment, amounting to $7,375, of the indemnity awarded to Richard Allen, an American citizen, alleging that the same has been attached by a Mr. Devot. "If the order upon the bank to which you refer was in terms payable to the diplomatic representative of the United States, it was not attachable, and the action of Haytian court violates diplomatic privilege. "If the money was deposited in the bank in such way as to become lawfully attachable, the Government of Hayti simply fails to fulfill its obligation to pay the money to the Government of the United States. "While we do not expect the Haytian Government to apply arbitrary constraint to her courts, yet if, instead of delivering the money directly to the legation, she has placed it for the time being in such a position that the courts may lawfully take cognizance thereof, her liability remains the same, and she is absolutely bound to make good the payment to our legation under any circumstances, since the debt of Hayti is one to the United States as a Government and not to the claimant as an individual. "You will apprise the minister for foreign affairs of these views and express the Department's confidence that the amount now due and payable on account of Mr. Allen's indemnity may be immediately turned over to you." Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, to Mr. Terres, chargé, June 21, 1895, For. Rel. 1895, II. 816. 66 The foregoing views were duly presented to the Haytian Government; but, on June 15, previously to their reception at Port au Prince, “an arrangement was made between Messrs. Devot and Allen by which the former agreed to raise the attachment," and the money was duly turned over to this legation by the National Bank of Haiti." (Mr. Terres, chargé, to Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, July 9, 1895, For. Rel. 1895, II. 816.) Mr. Adee, Act. Sec. of State, to Mr. Terres, chargé, Aug. 2. 1895, said: will doubtless tend to a better understanding of the subject in the As Henry de la Francia, the original claimant, was dead at the time of the passage of the supplementary act of 1848 (9 Stat. 736), authorizing the Secretary of State to settle his claim for advances, etc., and as the claim was assets belonging to his estate, the avails of which were to be accounted for as such, it was advised that the amount awarded should be paid only to an administrator duly appointed and authorized to receipt for the estate. As, however, it appeared that a competent court had decided Joseph de la Francia to be the sole distributee entitled to the amount from the administrators, the Secretary was advised to take a receipt from him or his attorney also. It was also held that under a power of attorney executed by Joseph de la Francia to James Bowie, the latter had authority to substitute Isaac Thomas in his stead; but that Thomas could not legally substitute William Cost Johnson in his stead. Johnson, At. Gen., 1849, 5 Op. 135, 137. It was further held that the receipt and acquittance in blank, purporting to have been signed by Isaac Thomas, if authentic, gives authority so to fill it up as to make it a full discharge and acquittance of all title to the sum awarded to said Joseph de la Francia by the Secretary of State. (Ibid.) Where money is due from the Government to the heirs of one deceased, and there is a dispute as to the legal descent, such dispute should be decided by the court rather than by the executive officers. Crittenden, At. Gen., 1853, 5 Op. 670. The provision in the statutes of the United States (10 Stat. 170), declaring that "all transfers and assignments hereafter made of any claim upon the United States. shall be absolutely null and void," does not apply to a claim against the Chinese indemnity fund under the control of the Department of State. Hubbell v. United States, 15 Ct. Cl. 546. The Government can not be held liable as a trustee for money received from a foreign power, in pursuance of a treaty for the satisfaction of claims of American citizens, unless the trust be declared by treaty or statute. Great Western Ins. Co. v. United States, 19 Ct. Cl. 206. By a clause in the diplomatic and consular appropriation act of February 26, 1896 (29 Stat. 32), "all moneys received by the Secretary of State from foreign governments and other sources, in trust for citizens of the United States or others, shall be deposited and covered into the Treasury." The Secretary of State is also to determine the amounts due to claimants from each of said trust funds, and to certify the same to the Secretary of the Treasury, who shall, upon the presentation of the certificate of the Secretary of State, pay the amount so found to be due. The Secretary of State has held that this statutory provision makes the funds in question trust funds, which he is in law bound to distribute to claimants according to their legal or equitable rights, as shown at the time of distribution." Mr. Rockhill, Assist. Sec. of State, to Mr. Shands, Oct. 26, 1896, 213 MS. As to the exemption of the Secretary of State from the control of the See, also, Hoar, At. Gen. (1869), 13 Op. 19. With reference to the case of Annie W. Frazer v. James E. Dexter et al., No. 16774, equity, then pending in the supreme court of the District of Columbia, Mr. Olney, in a letter to the Attorney-General, expressed the opinion that the case should be dismissed, so far as the Secretary of State and the United States were concerned. "My view," said Mr. Olney, " is that it can be dismissed, because the Mora money is held by the United States as sovereign and not as trustee or stakeholder for any person or persons; that the suit, though formally against the Secretary of State, is really against the United States, and that the disposition to be made of the money is a political question, to be decided by the political department of the Government and not by the judicial. At all events the judicial department can have no cognizance of that question until the political department shall have decisively acted. In support of this view, permit me to call your attention to the case of the United States v. The La Abra Mining Company et al., reported in the 29th volume of the Court of Claims, page 432. On page 459 you will find a citation by the counsel of the United States of some pertinent cases decided by the Supreme Court of the United States." Mr. Olney, Sec. of State, to the Attorney-General, Oct. 2, 1895, 205 MS. XVIII. NONPECUNIARY REDRESS. 1. CESSION OF TERRITORY. § 1061. As a rule cessions of territory, by way of indemnity, have been made at the close of a war as part of the arrangement by which peace was secured. Such was the case with cessions of territory made by Mexico to the United States in 1848 and by Spain to the United States in 1898. An example of the cession of territory in time of peace by way of satisfaction of claims may be found in the territorial transfers made to the United States by Spain in 1819, under the socalled Florida treaty. 2. APOLOGY. § 1062. In the case of the outrage by the Leopard on the Chesapeake, President Jefferson, as has been seen, issued a proclamation excluding British ships of war from the ports of the United States, and forbidding persons to visit them from the shore. As this made it necessary for them to resort to Halifax for water, provisions, and other conveniences, the British Government treated it as a grievance and refused to negotiate as to reparation until the proclamation was withdrawn. Mr. Rose, special envoy sent by Great Britain to the United States in 1807, argued that "if, when a wrong is committed, retaliation is immediately resorted to by the injured party, the door to pacific adjustment is closed, and the means of conciliation are precluded." Mr. Madison subsequently agreed that if reparation should be "tendered spontaneously" by Great Britain, the President would, on receipt of this act of reparation, revoke the proclamation. The negotiations were continued in 1809 by Mr. F. J. Jackson, the new British minister in the United States, but, owing to Mr. Jackson's conduct, Mr. Madison asked for his recall and afterwards dismissed him. Mr. Foster, Mr. Jackson's successor, on November 1, 1811, informed Mr. Monroe (1) that he was instructed "to repeat to the American Government the prompt disavowal by His Majesty (and recited in Mr. Erskine's note of April 17, 1809, to Mr. Smith) on being apprized of the unauthorized act of the officer in command of his naval forces on the coast of America, whose recall from a highly important and honorable command immediately ensued, as a mark of His Majesty's disapprobation;" (2) that he was "authorized to offer, in addition to that disavowal on the part of His Royal Highness, the immediate restoration, as far as circumstances will admit, of the men who, in consequence of Admiral Berkeley's orders, were forcibly taken out of the Chesapeake to the vessel from which they were taken; or, if that ship should be no longer in commission, to such seaport of the United States as the American Government may name for the purpose; and (3) that he was "also authorized to offer to the American Government a suitable pecuniary provision for the sufferers in consequence of the attack upon the Chesapeake, including the families of those seamen who unfortunately fell in action, and the wounded survivors." Mr. Monroe, replying to Mr. Foster, on the 12th of November, said: "It is much to be regretted that the reparation due for such an aggression as that committed on the United States' frigate the Chesapeake should have been so long delayed; nor could the translation of the offending officer from one command to another be regarded as constituting a part of a reparation otherwise |