Pelham v. Way

• Decision Date: 01 December 1872
• Parties: PELHAM v. WAY
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

82 U.S. 196

21 L.Ed. 55

15 Wall. 196

PELHAM v. WAY.

December Term, 1872

ERROR to the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Indiana.

An act of Congress, approved July 17th, 1862, and entitled 'An act to suppress insurrection, to punish treason and rebellion, to seize and confiscate the property of rebels, and for other purposes,' among other things, provided, 'that if any person within any State or Territory of the United States other than those named as aforesaid after the passage of this act, being engaged in armed rebellion against the government of the United States, or aiding or abetting such rebellion, shall not, within sixty days after public warning and proclamation duly given and made by the President of the United States, cease to aid, countenance, and abet such rebellion, and return to his allegiance to the United States, all the estate, property, money, stocks, and credits of such person, shall be liable to seizure as aforesaid, and it shall be the duty of the President to seize and use them as aforesaid, or the proceeds thereof;' and further, 'that to secure the condemnation, and sale of any such property, proceedings in rem shall be instituted in the name of the United States,' in the District Court; and that the proceeding shall conform as nearly as may be to proceedings in admiralty and revenue cases; 'and if said property, whether real or personal, shall be found to have belonged to a person engaged in rebellion, or who has given aid or comfort thereto, the same shall be condemned as enemies' property.'

The President of the United States, by proclamation duly made on the 25th day of July, A.D. 1862, issued public warning to all persons contemplated by the said provision, and the sixty days therein specified expired on the 23d day of September, A.D. 1862.

This act had twice at least been the subject of construction in this court. It came up once in Pelham v. Rose,¹ where this court took a distinction between the evidence of a credit and the credit itself; and held that when the debtor had given to his creditor a promissory note, and that note was in existence, and the thing proceeded against, it was necessary to the legal service of any monition that the marshal should seize and take it into his possession and control. The corollary was, that when the note, at the commencement of and during the pendence of proceedings to confiscate was beyond the jurisdiction of the marshal, there was no due service and no confiscation.

The same statute came up for consideration at a later date in Miller v. United States.²

In that case a libel had been filed under the act to confiscate railroad stocks belonging to a rebel, and the notice, instead of being served on the owner, was served on the officers of the railroad company.

The court held that the service was good. It said:

'The act of Congress made it the duty of the President to cause the seizure of all the estate, property, money, stocks, credits, and effects of the persons described, and in order to secure the condemnation and sale of such property after its seizure, directed judicial proceedings in rem to be instituted. It contemplated that every kind of property mentioned could be seized effectually in some mode. It had in view not only tangible property, but that which is in action. It named stocks and credits; but it gave no directions respecting the mode of seizure. It is, therefore, a fair conclusion that the mode was intended to be such as is adapted to the nature of the property directed to be seized, and in use in courts of revenue and admiralty. The modes of seizure must vary. Lands cannot be seized as movable chattels may. Actual manucaption cannot be taken of stocks and credits. But it does not follow from this that they are incapable of being seized, within the meaning of the act of Congress. Seizure may be either actual or constructive. . . . Garnishment almost everywhere exists. What is that but substantial attachment. It arrests the property in the hands of the garnishee, interferes with the owner's or creditor's control over it, subjects it to the judgment of the court, and therefore has the effect of a seizure. In all cases where the garnishee is a debtor, or where the garnishment is of stocks, it is effected by serving notice upon the debtor or corporation. A corporation holds its stock as a quasi trustee for its stockholders. The service of an attachment, though it is but a notice, binds the debt or the stock in the hands of the garnishee from the time of the service, and thenceforward it is potentially in 'gremio legis.' The statute declares that proceedings to confiscate shall conform, as nearly as may be, to proceedings in admiralty or revenue cases. Now, it is legitimate in certain proceedings in courts of admiralty, to attach credits and effects of such an intangible nature that they cannot be taken into actual possession by the marshal, and the mode of attachment is by notice, dependent upon statutory enactment.'

The court accordingly held that the confiscation and sale had made a valid transfer of the stock.

Under this already mentioned act of Congress, of July 17th, 1862, the United States, in 1863, filed a libel of information in the District Court for the District of Indiana, 'against the following described credits and effects of Henry Pelham, . . . that is to say, one promissory note dated March 1st, 1862, for the sum of $7000, and due four years after date, executed by Lewis Pelham to Henry Pelham.' Lewis Pelham was still in Indiana, and within the jurisdiction of the marshal; but Henry Pelham was in Kentucky, outside of the marshal's jurisdiction, and had the note with him there. The libel, after reciting the act...