Armstrong's Foundry

by Salmon P. Chase

United States Supreme Court

73 U.S. 766

Armstrong's Foundry

APPEAL from the Circuit Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana, the proceeding below being one for condemnation of property as used in aid of the rebellion, and resembling in its general features the case just disposed of. It was thus:

An act of Congress passed August 6th, 1861, 'to confiscate property used for insurrectionary purposes,' ^[1] enacted that property used in aid of the rebellion with consent of the owner, should be the lawful subject of prize and capture wherever found, and made it the duty of the President to cause it 'to be seized, confiscated, and condemned.' It enacted further that 'such prizes and captures shall be condemned in the District or Circuit Court of the United States having jurisdiction of the amount, or in admiralty in any district in which they may be seized, or into which they may be taken,' &c. And the attorney-general or any district attorney was to institute proceedings of condemnation himself, or by aid of an informer.

Under this act a libel of information was filed in the Circuit Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Louisiana, in which it was charged that certain property in New Orleans, known as Armstrong's Foundry, had been seized as forfeited to the United States by reason of having been used, with the consent of the owner, in aid of the rebellion. This libel closed with the usual prayer for condemnation. A claim was interposed by John Armstrong as owner, and another claim was interposed by the Citizens' Bank as mortgagee. Armstrong also pleaded the amnesty offered by President Lincoln, and his acceptance of it and compliance with the terms. On the hearing the plea of pardon was rejected, and a decree of condemnation was rendered. Armstrong alone appealed.

Subsequently, and while the cause was pending in this court, the President of the United States granted to 'the said John Armstrong a full pardon and amnesty for all offences by him committed, arising from participation, direct or implied, in the said rebellion, conditioned as follows.' Certain conditions were annexed. At this term Armstrong was allowed, in conformity with the usual course in admiralty cases, to plead the new matter, and to file with his plea a statement of facts agreed between his counsel and the Attorney-General, showing, among other things, that he had complied with all the conditions of the pardon granted to him.

The question now on the appeal was, whether this pardon relieved from forfeiture the property seized.

Mr. Stanbery, Attorney-General, and Mr. Ashton, special counsel for the United States:

1. 'A pardon,' this court declared in Ex Parte Garland, ^[2] 'reaches both the punishment prescribed for the offence and the guilt of the offender; and when the pardon is full, it releases the punishment, and blots out of existence the guilt, so that in the eye of the law the offender is as innocent as if he had never committed the offence. The effect of this pardon, then, is to relieve the petitioner from all penalties and disabilities attached to the offence of treason committed by his participation in the rebellion.' But this is the extent of a pardon. It cannot reach a forfeiture of property imposed, in virtue of the unlawful predicament in which the property may be found.

Now, the act of August 6th, 1861, does not affect property with liability to condemnation as a punishment for any offence of the owners, but as a means of suppressing the insurrection, then flagrant, by depriving those engaged therein of property subject to their control, and dedicated to their uses. The property is made the 'lawful subject of prize and capture wherever found.' These words draw the property in question within the category of enemy property, and establish a rule of capture.

2. But however affecting the interest of the United States, it cannot operate to remit the moiety which accrues to the informer. He has acquired a property in his part of the penalty. ^[3]

3. Under a statute of municipal forfeiture, such as this, proceedings for the condemnation of property seized on land, without the admiralty and maritime jurisdiction of the United States, are, ex necessitate rei, according to the course of the common law. ^[4] If reversed, the proceedings should follow that course.

Mr. Humphrey Marshall, contra.

The CHIEF JUSTICE delivered the opinion of the court.

Notes

1. 12 Stat. at Large, 319.
2. 4 Wallace, 380.
3. 4 Blackstone's Commentaries, 309; 2 Hawkins, 6, 392; Comyn's Digest, Pardon, F.
4. 1 Kent's Commentaries, 376; La Vengeance, 3 Dallas, 297; United States v. Sally, 2 Cranch, 406; United States v. Betsy, 4 Id. 443; The Samuel, 1 Wheaton 9; The Octavia, Id. 20; The Sarah, 8 Id. 391.