Price v. Forrest, 105

Citation173 U.S. 410,43 L.Ed. 749,19 S.Ct. 434
Decision Date06 March 1899
Docket NumberNo. 105,105
PartiesPRICE et al. v. FORREST et al
CourtUnited States Supreme Court

John C. Fay and Flavel McGee, for plaintiffs in error.

Cortlandt Parker and R. Wayne Parker, for defendants in error.

Mr. Justice HARLAN delivered the opinion of the court.

The ultimate question in this case is whether the plaintiffs in error, as heirs of Rodman M. Price, are entitled to receive from the United States the amount standing to the credit of the deceased on the books of the treasury, and which represents the balance of a sum found in his lifetime, under the authority of a special act of congress, to be due him upon an adjustment of his accounts as a purser in the navy.

The facts out of which arise the questions of law discussed by counsel are as follows:

In the year 1848 the decedent was assigned to duty on the Pacific Coast, in California, as purser and fiscal agent of the United States for the department of the navy. He acted in that capacity until about December, 1849, or January, 1850, when he was detached from such service, and ordered to transfer all public money and property remaining in his hands to his successor, or to such other disbursing officer of the navy as might be designated by the commanding officer at the naval station at California, and immediately after such transfer to report at the city of Washington for the purpose of settling his accounts.

A. M. Van Nostrand was his successor, in California, as acting purser in the navy.

About December 31, 1849, Commodore Jones, of the navy, commanding the United States squadron at San Francisco, directed Van Nostrand to receive from Price all books, papers, office furniture, and funds on hand belonging to the purser's department at that city. Thereupon Price turned over to Van Nostrand, as acting purser of the navy, at San Francisco, $45,000, that being all the public money remaining in his hands.

Subsequently, on the 14th day of January, 1850, and out of his private funds alone, Price advanced to Van Nostrand $75,000, taking a re eipt therefor as follows: 'San Francisco, January 14th, 1850. Received from Rodman M. Price, purser U. S. navy, seventy-five thousand dollars, for which I hold myself responsible to the United States treasury department. $75,000. (Duplicate.) A. M. Van Nostrand, Acting Purser.' This money was so advanced without the approval and signature of Commodore Jones.

Van Nostrand never returned the $75,000, or any part of it, to Price, nor did he account for it to the government.

Price insisted that the United States should reimburse him for the amount so advanced by him, but the officers of the government denied its liability to him on that account. In an elaborate opinion, given March 12, 1854, Atty. Gen. Cushing held that, while the appointment of Van Nostrand as acting purser was lawful and valid under the circumstances, the government could not be charged with the private funds paid to him by Price, although the latter be- lieved at the time that his advance of money to the former was an accommodation to the government in the then unsettled condition of California. 6 Op. Attys. Gen. 357.

Finally, by an act approved February 23, 1891, entitled 'An act for the relief of Rodman M. Price,' the secretary of the treasury of the United States was 'authorized and directed to adjust upon principles of equity and justice the accounts of Rodman M. Price, late purser in the United States navy and acting navy agent at San Francisco, California, crediting him with the sum paid over to and receipted for by his successor, A. M. Van Nostrand, acting purser, January 14th, 1850, and pay to said Rodman M. Price, or his heirs, out of any money in the treasury not otherwise appropriated, any sum that may be found due him upon such adjustment.' 26 Stat. 1371.

Under the authority conferred by that act, the secretary of the treasury in August, 1892, adjusted the accounts of Price; and in that adjustment he was credited with the sum advanced to Van Nostrand, leaving due to him from the government the sum of $76,204.08, which, of course, included the above sum of $75,000.

In order that the precise questions to be determined upon this writ of error may be clearly apprehended, we must now refer to certain matters occurring in the courts of New Jersey, both prior to and shortly after the passage of the above act of February 23, 1891.

In the year 1857, Samuel Forrest recovered in the supreme court of New Jersey a judgment against Rodman M. Price for the sum of $17,000 and costs. Execution upon that judgment was returned unsatisfied. Forrest died in 1860 intestate. In 1874 his wife, one of the present defendants in error, was appointed and qualified as administratrix of his estate. In the same year she sued out a writ of scire facias to revive the above judgment, and it was revived. In the bill seeking a revivor of the judgment she alleged facts tending to show that Price had an interest in certain lands, and also that he had equitable things in action or other property to the amount of many thousand dollars, exclusive of all claims thereon and of all exemptions allowed by law, which she had been unable to reach by execution on the above judgment. By that bill the administratrix also prayed discovery from Price of all property, real or personal, whether in possession or action, belonging to him, with full particulars in relation thereto, and that the same, under the order of court, be appropriated in satisfaction of such judgment; further, that a receiver be appointed in the cause to collect and take charge of the property, money, or things in action found to belong to Price, or to which he was in any way entitled, either in law or equity, with power to convert the same into money, and with such other powers as were usually granted to receivers in similar cases; and that Price be enjoined from assigning, transferring, or making any other disposition of the real estate and personal property to which he was in any wise entitled, and from receiving any moneys then due or to become due to him, except where the same were held in trust, or the funds held in trust proceeded from other persons than himself.

The defendants to that bill were Price and his wife and son, the latter being alleged to claim some interest in the property described in the bill. They appeared and filed an answer, Price denying that any part of the properties mentioned in the bill belonged to him, or that he had any interest in them.

After the filing of that answer, the cause slept until August 9, 1892, when Mrs. Forrest, as administratrix of the estate of her husband, filed a petition stating that, since the filing of her bill of complaint in that cause, no payment had been made on the judgment against Price, and that neither she nor her solicitors had been able to find any personalty or real estate belonging to Price by levy upon and sale of which any part of the amount due on the judgment could be obtained; that it had lately come to her knowledge that about $45,000 was about to be paid to Price by officers of the treasury of the United States as the sum found to be due him by an accounting then lately had between him and the government; that that sum was to be paid by the delivery to Price or to his attorneys of a draft of the treasurer of the United States, or some other negotiable security made or issued by its financial officers, and drawn payable to his order, the rules of the department forbidding that it be made payable to the order of any other person, or that said sum should be paid in any other way, and that said draft or negotiable security was to be made, and the transaction closed, on the 15th day of August thereafter; and that, if Price obtained said money from the United States, he would, unless restrained, put the same beyond the reach of the petitioner. The prayer of the petition was that a receiver of the draft or other negotiable security be appointed, and that Price be ordered and directed, immediately on the receipt of such draft or security, to indorse the same to the receiver, to the end that the amount thereof might be received by him as an officer of the court and disposed of according to law.

On the presentation of the petition, with affidavits in its support, the chancellor, on the 8th day of August, 1892, issued a rule, returnable at chancery chambers September 12th following, that Price show cause why the prayer of the petition should not be granted, and an injunction issue, and a receiver be appointed, pursuant to that prayer; which rule further directed that Price should be, and was thereby, restrained and enjoined from making any indorsement of the draft referred to in the petition.

A duly-certified copy of that order, pursuant to directions therein, was served upon Price on the 10th day of August, 1892. Nevertheless, after that date, Price received from the assistant treasurer of the United States at Washington, and without permission of the court collected, four several drafts, signed by that officer, for the respective sums of $2,704.08, $13,500, $20,000, and $9,000, in all the sum of $45,204.08; leaving in the hands of the United States, of the amount due on the settlement of Price's accounts, the sum of about $31,000.

On the 10th day of October, 1892, Charles Borcherling was appointed by the chancery court receiver in said cause of the property and things in action belonging or due to, or held in trust for, Price at the time of issuing said executions, or at any time afterwards, and especially of said four drafts, with authority to possess, receive, and sue for such property and things in action and the evidence thereof, and it was made the duty of the receiver to hold such drafts subject to the further order of the court. The receiver was required to give bond in the sum of $40,000, conditioned for the faithful discharge of his duties. At the same time Price was ordered to convey and deliver to the receiver all such...

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