Cochran v. Schell Schell v. Cochran

• Decision Date: 07 May 1883
• Parties: COCHRAN and others, Survivors, etc., v. SCHELL, late Collector, etc. SCHELL, late Collector, etc., v. COCHRAN and another, Survivors, etc
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

107 U.S. 625

2 S.Ct. 827

27 L.Ed. 543

COCHRAN and others, Survivors, etc., v. SCHELL, late Collector, etc.

SCHELL, late Collector, etc.,

v. COCHRAN and another, Survivors, etc.

May 7, 1883.

Geo. Bliss, for motion.

S. F. Phillips, in opposition.

BLATCHFORD, J.

These writs of error were brought to review a judgment rendered by the circuit court of the United States for the southern district of New York, October 14, 1882, nunc pro tunc as of October 7, 1882, in favor of Thomas Cochran and William Barbour, surviving partners of S. Cochran & Co., against Augustus Schell, late collector of customs, for the sum of $1,892.83, composed of $1,734.80 damages and $158.03 costs. The damages were for excessive fees exacted at the custom-house on entries, and the writ of error brought by Schell was brought to review the judgment in respect to the recovery for such fees. The writ of error brought by S. Cochran & Co. was based on their failure to recover in the suit for duties paid under protest. The writs of error were heard together at this term, and the judgment was affirmed; the recovery for the fees and the failure to recover for the duties being both of them sustained. The judgment of this court, as set forth in the mandate, was rendered March 19, and covered both writs of error, and directed that the judgment of the circuit court be affirmed, 'with interest until paid, at the same rate per annum that similar judgments bear in the courts of the state of New York.' The mandate was sent to the court below on the fourth of April, and now the solicitor general, representing the United States, moves, on behalf of Schell, to correct the judgment and the mandate by striking out the direction as to interest, so that the judgment rendered October 14, 1882, shall not carry interest up to the time a new judgment is rendered by the court below on the mandate.

This application appears to be based on the construction given to a decision made by the circuit court for the southern district of New York, in January, 1882, in White v. Arthur, 10 Fed. Rep. 80. That was a suit against a collector of customs to recover duties paid, in which the circuit court rendered a judgment for the plaintiffs, March 1, 1881, for $2,295.90, and where at the trial of the action the court had made a certificate of probable cause, under section 989 of the Revised Statutes. The judgment being presented for payment out of the treasury, under that section, the amount of the face of it was paid, without any interest on it after its rendition. The court being applied to by the attorney for the United States to direct satisfaction of the judgment to be entered of record, it was held that the government was not liable for any interest on the amount of the judgment after its entry. This decision was founded on a consideration of the statutory provisions on the subject of the payment out of the treasury of the amount of a judgment recovered against a collector of customs or other officer of the revenue, for money paid to him and by him paid into the treasury in the performance of his official duty, where a certificate of probable cause is granted. The result reached was that, under the language of the appropriation bills of 1878, 1879, 1880, and 1881,—Act June 14, 1878, § 3, (20 St. at Large, 128;) Act March 3, 1879, § 1, (Id. 414;) Act June 16, 1880, § 1, (21 St. at Large, 242;) Act March 3, 1881, § 1, (Id. 418,)—interest accruing after the entry of such a judgment, on its amount, or on the money so paid to the officer, is not to be paid by the government; and that, under section 989, the officer is not personally liable for such interest.

This court has never made any decision on the points thus ruled on in White v. Arthur. The case of Erskine v. Van Arsdale, 15 Wall. 75, was a suit to recover back an internal-revenue tax illegally exacted. The court below had instructed THE JURY THAT THEY MIGHT, IN THEIR VERDICT, ADD INTEREST TO THE Tax paid. this court held that instruction to be correct, but the only decision was that interest might be added from the time of the illegal exaction to the verdict. Nothing was decided as to...