Court : US Supreme Court
..... . they considered themselves in their different functions virtually discharging their respective duties, in carrying the act into execution, according to the general received opinion of the day; they never intended to purge a forfeiture if it had really accrued, nor to excuse the non- performance of a condition if it had not been complied with; agreeably to the public will expressed in a legislative ..... [ footnote 3 ] in the argument in that case, it was insisted by the counsel for the plaintiffs, that the board of property in their resolves, and the governor by his patent, represented the commonwealth pro hac vice; and that interests vested under them, which could not afterwards be defeated ..... ? will not the proviso in the 9th section of the act of the 3d of april 1792, excuse the temporary non-performance of an act, rendered highly dangerous, if not absolutely impracticable, by imperious circumstances, over which he had no ..... on the first of these points, we observe, that it has never been contended, that the holland company have performed the condition within two years; but only, that the condition was discharged, or suspended, by the operation of the proviso, on the facts of their case; particularly the fact that an indian war existed for several years, beyond the term of two years specified in the act of assembly ..... . whether the proviso operates upon cases that are brought within its terms, to discharge the condition entirely, or only to enlarge the time for performing .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... " it has been insisted at the bar, that, as the original grant of jurisdiction to the supreme and inferior courts is general, and the clause assigning original jurisdiction to the supreme court contains no negative or restrictive words, the power remains to the legislature to assign original jurisdiction to that court in ..... when the subject was brought before the court, the decision was not that a mandamus would not lie to the head of a department directing him to perform an act enjoined by law, in the performance of which an individual had a vested interest, but that a mandamus ought not to issue in that case -- the decision necessarily to be made if the ..... law being deemed unconstitutional at the circuits, was repealed, and a different system was established; but the question whether those persons who had been reported by the judges, as commissioners, were entitled, in consequence of that report, to be placed on the pension list was a legal question, properly determinable in the courts, although the act of placing such persons on the list was ..... after dividing the district into two counties, the eleventh section of this law enacts, "that there shall be appointed in and for each of the said counties such number of discreet persons to be justices of the peace as the president ..... operation, negative of other objects than those affirmed, and, in this case, a negative or exclusive sense must be given to them or they have no operation ..... class of cases which come under the description of damnum .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... 292, 293 which shall be produced to them, what sum or sums ought, on the principles of the aforesaid law, to be allowed to the respective owners; and the receiver-general shall thereupon deliver a certificate of such sum or sums to the respective owners and enter a credit in his books, for the same, which may be transferred to any person, and passed as credit, either in taking out ..... that it shall and may be lawful for the board of property, and they are hereby enjoined and required, to proceed upon the reports of the commissioners appointed by the act passed the twenty-eighth day of march, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven, entituled 'an act for ascertaining and confirming to certain persons, called connecticut claimants, the lands by them claimed within the county of luzerne,' which have been filed in the office ..... the same had been made by the board of property immediately after the report of the aforesaid commissioners, in pursuance of the law herein before mentioned: and provided further, that the claimants, who are by this act intended to be compensated, shall, at the time of receiving the certificates aforesaid, release to the commonwealth their respective claims to the lands, for which they shall receive compensation. ..... the application for the rule, was founded upon an act of the general assembly, passed on the 9th of march 1796, (4 vol. p. 16 ..... which, however, had been repealed by the act of the 1st of april 1790 ..... which contains the following enacting clause: sect. 1. .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... was afterwards covenanted between the parties that the captain should be instructed by his owner to touch at falmouth, there to lie off and on twenty-four hours or longer if desired, in daylight, during which time there will come off orders from the consignees; on receiving these orders, the captain must proceed to such one of certain designated ports as the orders should specify. ..... the orders of the consignee might excuse a from any action brought by b for loss sustained by him in consequence of the vessel going into falmouth, which was a breach of the covenant of a, but these orders, being beyond the scope of the authority of the consignee, cannot entitle a to an action against ..... fox replied that he had received no orders for him and that therefore he must bring the vessel into the port of falmouth, and there remain until orders were received for him to proceed to his port ..... but on looking into the provisional articles, the general expressions here used will be found to be ..... ; as the latter are the operative words which really constitute the contract, it is conceived that they ought to prevail in construing that ..... these orders were given to avoid the penalties of the british hovering act, which subjected to forfeiture the vessel and cargo if found in the situation in which the nancy would have been if she had waited for orders without entering the ..... " if this clause provides for every detention whatever, however it may be occasioned, the inquiry is at an end, and the judgment should be .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... of congress to have been not to change in any respect the existing laws further than the new situation of the district rendered indispensably necessary, and that the fines, penalties, and forfeitures alluded to in the act, are those only which accrued by law in the whole or in part to government, and for the recovery of which the remedy was by indictment or information in the name of the state in which the ..... the first section of the first act, declaring that the laws of the two states respectively should remain in force in the parts of the territory ceded by each, was perhaps only declaratory of a principle which would have been in full operation without such declaration; yet it manifests very clearly an intention in congress not to take up the subject of a review of the laws of the district at that time, but to leave things ..... of virginia, an indictment for this penalty could not be sustained, but it is contended that the clause in the supplemental act which has been recited makes a new appropriation of the penalty and gives a new remedy for its ..... subsequent to the act of assumption, an act passed supplementary to the act entitled "an act concerning the district of columbia," the second section of which is in these words: "all indictments shall run in the name of the united states and conclude against the peace and government thereof, and all fines, ..... section of the act to the 16th is employed on subjects where the mere change of government required the intervention of the general .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... current money was to be given for property then to be delivered, no doubt would be entertained but that the case would come within the law although the thing sold would pass out of the vendor after 1 january, 1782; yet the contract to pay the money was entered into in 1779, and in the general legislative view of the subject the value of the money at the date of the contract is supposed to have regulated the price ..... the scale of depreciation which shall constitute the rule by which the value of the debts, contracts, and demands in the act mentioned shall be ascertained, and the fifth section enacts "that where a suit shall be brought for the recovery of a debt and it shall appear that the value thereof hath been tendered and refused, or where it shall appear that the ..... used in the third member of the sentence are certainly very comprehensive, and their general natural import does not appear to be so restrained by their connection with other parts of the section as necessarily to confine their operation to cases where debtors only can derive advantage from them. ..... not the opinion of the court, and it may very readily be perceived that the great mass of contracts made during the circulation of paper money may be decided by a general scale estimating the value of those contracts, although there may be very strong features in some few cases which distinguish them as of such peculiar character that they are embraced by the clause which measures their value by the standard of justice. .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... but when it is observed that the general clause of the first section of the "act, which declares that such vessels may be seized, and may be prosecuted in any district or circuit court, which shall be holden within or for the district where the seizure shall be made," obviously contemplates a seizure within the united states, and that the fifth section gives a special authority to seize on the high seas, and limits that authority to the seizure ..... hereof, and if upon examination it shall appear that such ship or vessel is bound or sailing to any port or place within the territory of the french republic or her dependencies contrary to the intent of this act, it shall be the duty of the commander of such public armed vessel to seize every such ship or vessel engaged in such illicit commerce and send the same to the nearest port in the united states, and ..... , without any special authority for that purpose, in the then existing state of things, have empowered the officers commanding the armed vessels of the united states to seize and send into port for adjudication american vessels which were forfeited by being engaged in this illicit commerce. ..... this act did not authorize the capture of a vessel sailing from a french port, and the orders of the president of the united states to the commanders of the armed vessels of the united states enjoining the seizure of american vessels sailing from french ports will not protect them from a claim for damages for the capture of a vessel coming from .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... , the investment of the proceeds, and the intention, that the real estate, shall be held to the same uses, as the certificates, according to the apportionment of the will of 1787, or such other last will, as general stewart might make, it concludes with reserving a power of revocation, by consent of both parties, to sell the trust estate, and to vest the proceeds in other funds, but in the name of the same trustees, and ..... trust was a paper medium, as negotiable by delivery as a bank note; and shifting as it did from new loan to federal stock, from stock to money, on what rational ground (considering, particularly, that general stewart held similar certificates and similar stock in his own right) can it be sustained, that the purchase of the real estate, was made with the proceeds of the identical certificates delivered on the marriage? ..... all subsequent creditors; that an agreement for a settlement made in writing, before, and in contemplation of, marriage, will always be carried into effect; that a parol promise of a settlement, made before, and in contemplation of, marriage, is equally valid in pennsylvania, although the law upon the subject has been altered in england, by an act of parliament; and that even where there is no previous agreement between the parties, a court of equity will never grant a wife's ..... the deed is not only void, as it contains a clause of revocation, and cannot be regarded as a legal settlement; but it is fraudulent, as it remained in the possession and .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... duly and justly captured by the french privateer commanded by citizen nadal, to whom we adjudge her as property belonging to him, and of which he may dispose under the clauses and conditions made with his officers and crew, he being accountable for the duties of invalids and the costs of the tribunal, which he shall pay to the bearer of our notary's order ..... considerations: but every effort being ineffectual for that purpose, the court observed, that they could not, on the one hand, exercise the oppression of coercing a juror to act in contradiction to his real religious, and conscientious scruples; nor, on the other, would they expose the defendant to the consequences of a trial, in which he might lose, but could not possibly obtain, ..... notwithstanding the explicit decision and direction of the court, one of the jurors refused, during four days, to concur in a general verdict for the defendant; declaring, in open court, 'that although he stood alone, he would only lay down his opinion with his life: for, he never ..... situation of france, spain, and england, on the co-operation of the two former in hostilities against the last. ..... 308, 310 from which it appears, first, that the papers having been thrown into the sea by the captain in sight of the privateer which captured him, secondly, that the captain and supercargo having precipitately abandoned their ship, in spite ..... her cargo were delivered to the captors by the spanish governor of porto rico, with permission to sell them there. .....
Tag this Judgment!Court : US Supreme Court
..... if the duty is payable on sugars refined before 30 june, 1802, whenever they may be sent out, that duty will fall on the refiner himself, because sugars refined before the 30th of june must come into the market at the same price with those refined afterwards, and cannot sell, in consideration of the duty with which they are burdened, at a higher price than sugars admitted not to be chargeable with that duty. ..... (2 cranch) 33 error to the circuit court of the united states for the pennsylvania district syllabus sugar refined but not sent out of the refinery for sale before 1 july, 1802, when the act of congress respecting certain internal taxes came into operation, is not liable to duty. ..... it is and must be admitted that the first part of the first section of the repealing law does away any forfeiture which was to be produced by the future operation of the act repealed. ..... that a law is the best expositor of itself, that every part of an act is to be taken into view for the purpose of discovering the mind of the legislature, and that the details of one part may contain regulations restricting the extent of general expressions used in another part of the same act are among those plain rules laid down by common sense for the exposition of statutes which have been uniformly acknowledged. ..... that saving clause is in these words, "provided, &c. .....
Tag this Judgment!