Mahan v. United States
Decision Date | 01 December 1872 |
Citation | 21 L.Ed. 307,16 Wall. 143,83 U.S. 143 |
Parties | MAHAN v. UNITED STATES |
Court | U.S. Supreme Court |
APPEAL from the Court of Claims; the case as found by that court, from the evidence, being thus:
One Mitchell, of Mississippi, being indebted to his stepdaughter, of whose estate he had been the guardian, mortgaged, with his wife (the mother of the step-daughter mentioned), a life estate which the wife had in a valuable cotton farm in Mississippi, near the river of that name; and soon afterwards died. Mrs. Mitchell, his widow, became administratrix of his estate. In 1861 the rebellion broke out. There were at this time one hundred and sixteen bales of cotton on the farm; and the war being flagrant in Mississippi, the Confederate general ordered all cotton near the river, under penalty of being burnt, to be removed from it, in order to prevent its capture by the forces of the United States.
In compliance with this order, Mrs. Mitchell removed the cotton to Kingston, near Natchez, where it was stacked and covered.
Not succeeding in this, and the cotton being sold, and the Captured and Abandoned Property Act being passed, which allowed loyal owners of property captured in the South and so disposed of, to apply to the Court of Claims for the proceeds, the daughter (now re-married to one Mahan) filed with her husband a petition in the court just named, to have the money which, on sale of it, the cotton had brought. The Court of Claims said:
The court accordingly dismissed the petition, and from that dismissal this appeal came.
Mr. R. M. Corwine, for the appellant:
I confess myself embarrassed at the very outset in the discussion of the ownership of the cotton when captured. The testimony is clear and direct, even as stated by the court below in its findings, and free from any doubt. And yet that court find that what was done did not amount to such a sale as would pass the title. [The counsel then went into an examination of the findings.]
But on the case as found it cannot be doubted that, as between the mother and daughter, there was a good contract of sale. The price was fixed, the number of bales (116) ascertained, and the precise location of the cotton understood between the parties. It was that particular lot of cotton which was stored at Kingston, and distinctly marked and piled up there. This was enough to authorize the daughter to take possession and control the cotton as against the mother; and, if possession had been refused, she could have filed her...
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