Senate Documents, Otherwise Publ. as Public Documents and Executive Documents

close of the rebellion from a foreign firm by Dennistoun, Wood & Co., of New York, it was thought advisable by eminent counsel to pay the sum of $53,000 for a final settlement and release the money on deposit.

The resolution requires me to report the evidence upon which such property or its proceeds was released. To copy the affidavits filed during nearly five years in these cases would apparently employ any force I have at my command for such a purpose for over six months; I have, therefore, thought it more in accordance with the wishes of the Senate to make this present answer to the other points of inquiry, and in regard to the evidence to propose to send for its inspection the documents on file in any particular case that may be demanded, or to make a supplementary report whenever it can be prepared.

The evidence in such case is of the nature indicated briefly in my letter of March 2, 1867. Prior to the close of the rebellion claimants were invariably required to furnish competent proof of loyalty.

The authority under which action had been taken by the department, and cotton and other property, or its proceeds, returned to its owners, was also concisely but distinctly stated in the aforesaid letter. It was the opinion of my predecessors in office that it was not only the right, but the duty of the Treasury Department to examine the facts in relation to all property coming to the hands of its agents; and if it appeared that the same had been taken in violation of law, to restore it or its proceeds to its owners. The rule as adopted by them was sufficiently broad to authorize them to adjudicate the title to property taken by the army or navy and turned over to agents of the Treasury Department. But after the capture of Savannah, and of the large amounts of cotton therein, the Attorney General gave the department his opinion, that all questions arising with reference to property taken by the military authorities could be adjudicated in the Court of Claims; which opinion has since governed the action of the department as to cases considered as fairly within the purview of the same.

In relation, however, to cotton or other property taken possession of by treasury agents without military assistance or intervention, I have followed the practice of my predecessors, and have investigated the circumstances of the seizure; and if it has appeared in any case that the property was not rightfully subject to seizure, I have restored the same or its proceeds to its lawful owners. In view of the action taken by my predecessors, who established the settled practice of the department, and in the absence of any legislation for the purpose of altering that practice, it seems to me that it would not only have been inexpedient, but unlawful, for me to have refused to take similar action to revise and correct the errors, mistakes, and frauds of my own subordinate officers and agents. It would hardly have been tolerated, if the department at the close of the rebellion had sent throughout the south agents to collect captured and confederate property, and had refused to exercise the authority to revise and control their proceedings. If an agent seized the private property of an individual through mistake or error, or for fraudulent purposes, and the owner presented himself at the department with full and undisputed proof of the facts, could the department justify itself in refusing to correct the wrong done to a citizen, and refer him to the Court of Claims for his only remedy? If such had been the rule, acts of robbery and oppression without number would have attended the efforts which were made to secure the property which rightfully belonged to the government. In the view taken by the department, the late Attorney General, Hon. James Speed, concurred, as will be seen by his opinion in the case of Joseph P. Billups, a copy of which is herewith transmitted, marked E.

After the rebellion was practically terminated by the surrender of the confederate armies in the spring of 1865, all restrictions upon trade were removed; and it was decided to confine the action of the department to the seizure and conversion to the uses of the government of property which had been transferred

by its owner to the uses of the so-called confederacy, and had become in form the property of such confederacy, or such as had been captured by the military forces, or which had been used directly or indirectly, or intended to be used, in aid of the rebellion. While thus engaged in making collections of the aforesaid property, agents of the department frequently seized the property of private individuals, who complained to the department for redress, which, upon clear proof, was duly afforded. In some cases of this character, it is possible that property seized or detained was restored to its owners without requiring proof that they had not aided the rebellion. To have required such proof would have been practically allowing the agents of the department to seize, after the war closed, the private property of any southern citizen, when their instructions were to collect only property which answers to the above description. In no case, however, it is believed, was property or its proceeds restored to any unpadoned rebel.

In some important cases in which the numerous and imperfect affidavits seemed to require a more rigid analysis than usual, I have not trusted to the clerks in charge for a report, nor to my own judgment exclusively, and have procured the opinion of eminent counsel before action. Not involving a distinct point of law for decision, these cases could not be submitted to the Attorney General, whose duties do not embrace the investigation of facts. In such cases the fee of the special counsel has been made a charge upon the proceeds of the property in question, whether the petition for release was allowed or rejected. In no other way have claimants been required by any action of the department "to pay any fee or compensation of any kind to any attorney or other person." In further reply to the resolution of the Senate I have the honor herewith to transmit copies of the correspondence between this department and the various officers of the Court of Claims in relation to judgments rendered by said court in cotton cases. Judgments to the amount of $131,450 58 having been rendered by the court in favor of claimants of cotton taken by the military forces during the rebellion, I deemed it my duty, on account of the importance of the questions which had arisen, and of the large amounts involved in similar cases to follow, to endeavor to secure appeals therein to the Supreme Court of the United States. Motions being duly made for that purpose and fully argued, the Court of Claims decided that no right of appeal to the Supreme Court existed by statute in this class of cases, and refused to allow the appeals. Being called upon, therefore, in pursuance of law, to pay the judgments, I submitted the question to the First Comptroller of the Treasury, who advised that the decisions were not conclusive as to the net proceeds remaining in the treasury of any specific property, and that it was my duty to ascertain the exact amount thereof before paying the judgments. Knowing that the calculations made by the court were based upon the deposition of an agent whose accounts had not been officially examined and passed, I revised them to make them conform to the official statements, and in all cases paid what was ascertained to be, as nearly as possible, the correct amount. With great respect, your obedient servant,

HUGH MCCULLOCH,

The PRESIDENT of the United States Senate.

Secretary of the Treasury.

THE

THIRTY-NINTH CONGRESS, SECOND SESSION. [SENATE Ex. Doc. No. 37.] Letter of the Secretary of the Treasury, communicating, in compliance with a resolution of the Senate of February 5, 1867, information in relation to the amount of money received from sales of cotton or other property turned over to the Treasury Department under the several laws of Congress, and the disposition made of the same.

TREASURY DEPARTMENT, March 2, 1867. SIR: I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of a resolution of inquiry adopted in the Senate on the 5th of February last, in the following words: "That the Secretary of the Treasury be directed to report, for the information. of Congress, what amount of money has been received from sales of cotton or other property turned over to the Treasury Department under the several laws of Congress, and what disposition has been made of the same; whether any of the money has been paid or refunded to claimants; and if so, the names of such claimants, the amounts severally paid, and under what authority of law and upon what evidence such payments have been made.”

In response to the inquiry concerning the amount of money received from sales of cotton or other property, &c., I have the honor to state that by reports furnished to the chairman of the sub-committee of the Joint Committee on Retrenchment, on the 14th of November last, which were prepared by the proper accounting officers of the department, it appears that the total amount received from the various sources, properly enumerated under the general head of captured and abandoned property, was $34,052,809 54, of which amount the sum of $24,742,022 55 remains as net proceeds.

The voluminous detailed statements upon which these figures are based, and to which reference is hereby respectfully made, were placed in the possession of the sub-committee alluded to at the time stated. It is presumed they are, at any time, accessible to or subject to the call of the Senate.

In response to the remaining clauses of the resolution, I have the honor to transmit herewith two tabular statements, marked respectively A and B, and to state, in explanation thereof, that since the passage of the act of March 12, 1863, concerning captured and abandoned property, &c., Secretary Chase, Secretary Fessenden, and the present Secretary of the Treasury have, in certain cases, ordered the redelivery to claimants of cotton and other property which was taken possession of by agents or officers of the government, under the belief that the same ought to be so taken possession of as captured or abandoned, but which, upon an investigation of the facts, proved not to be legally. or properly liable to such seizure; and also in certain cases where such cotton and other property so improperly taken had been converted into money, which had not been covered into the treasury, have ordered the payment of such proceeds to the claimants.

The accompanying statements referred to show in what particular cases and to what amount such redeliveries and payments have been made.

The claims examined and decided have been numerous and complicated. The papers and evidence in the same are voluminous, and cannot be readily incorporated into a general statement; but the same are of record in the department, and, in any case which the Senate desire specially to investigate, will be submitted for examination.

All moneys realized from the sales of property received under the act in question and other similar acts, not repaid to claimants as set forth in statements A and B, or disbursed as expenses of collecting and disposing of the same as provided by law, have passed into the hands of the Treasurer of the United States, and have also been regularly covered into the treasury as receipts from captured Ex. Doc. 56-2

and abandoned property, except the sum of $500,000, now on deposit with the Farmers' Loan and Trust Company of New York, to secure the sureties on a bond required to be given by Simeon Draper, late cotton agent at New York, in a suit against him, and now pending in New York, instituted by the firm of Dennistoun & Co., to recover the proceeds of alleged blockade cotton, taken by agents of the government and shipped to Mr. Draper, for sale; and except, also, about $700,000 which remains uncovered, for the payment of expenses incident to the collection, care, and disposition of such property, as provided by law; to defray the expenses of certain suits for the recovery of such property or its proceeds, now being prosecuted abroad; to satisfy any judgments which may be obtained against any agents of the department in suits instituted against them for acts done in an official capacity concerning such property; and also to await the final settlement of certain specific claims pending for the proceeds of property alleged to have been wrongfully taken, which the department may properly adjudicate.

In all cases arising under the statutes relative to captured, abandoned, or confiscable property, where the same was taken possession of by agents or officers of the Treasury Department, without the intervention of the military authori ties, Secretary Chase, Secretary Fessenden, and the present Secretary, have felt authorized to revise the action and correct the errors of subordinate officers of the department; to investigate the facts and circumstances relative to property so seized, and to restore the same or its proceeds to the owners, if it had been illegally or improperly taken.

The action of the present Secretary in this class of cases has been in accordance with oral and written opinions, given in particular cases by the late Attor ney General, Hon. James Speed.

In cases where property has been taken possession of by military authorities, and delivered to agents of the Treasury Department, some doubt has existed as to whether the department could revise the action of the military authorities and restore property unlawfully taken.

Secretary Chase inclined to the opinion that the Treasury Department could not take jurisdiction in any case of military seizure, but on the 13th of May, 1864, he submitted the question to the Solicitor of the Treasury, who, on the 26th of May, advised the Secretary that "the fact that such property may have been turned over to the agent of this department by military authorities does not, in any manner, affect the power or duty of the department or its agents to inquire whether or not the property is in truth such as is described by the act, and that both the power and the duty to make such inquiry-first, in the agent, and next, in the head of the Treasury Department, of which such agent is a subordinate officer-seems to arise necessarily out of the nature of the duties to be performed. The agent is not to take all property indiscriminately, but such only as is specified in the law. Who is to determine whether any given parcel of property is such as he is required to take or not? I cannot doubt that it is first himself and afterwards his superior, the Secretary of the Treasury." A copy of the Solicitor's opinion is annexed, and marked C.

Secretary Fessenden adopted the opinion of the Solicitor, and on the 22d of August, 1864, formally approved the same by the following indorsement

thereon:

I concur in the opinion of the Solicitor.

AUGUST 22, 1864.

WM. P. FESSENDEN.

The department acted upon this opinion, although the cases in which releases of property or its proceeds were made were few and not of large amount, until some time after the capture of the Savannah cotton. The large amounts involved in that capture made the question one of such importance that it was submitted by the present Secretary of the Treasury, on the 17th of June, 1865,

to the Attorney General, Hon. James Speed, who, on the 5th of July, 1865, gave his opinion that jurisdiction to examine the facts and to restore the property of loyal citizens improperly taken by the military authorities could not be taken by the President or Secretary of the Treasury, or any commission by them appointed, but that the proceeds of such property ought to be paid into the treasury, to await the action of the Court of Claims or of Congress.

A copy of the opinion of the Attorney General is annexed, marked D. This opinion of the Attorney General has since governed the action of this department as to cases considered as fairly coming within the purview of the

same.

In accordance with the views above stated, the cases specified in statement B, hereto annexed, have been examined and allowed by the present Secretary and his immediate predecessor in office. Upon the proof of any unlawful taking of private property by agents of the department, the facts being shown by satisfactory affidavits, the reports of agents or by other adequate written evidence, the agents holding such property have been ordered to restore the same to the owners, or the proceeds, if not actually covered into the treasury, have been paid to them by order of the department.

With great respect, your obedient servant,

The PRESIDENT of the Senate.

H. McCULLOCH,

Secretary of the Treasury.

A.-Statement of claims for cotton voluntarily abandoned by its owners to agents of the Treasury Department.

Nov. 30, 1863
April 25, 1864
Feb. 5, 1864
Aug. 18, 1863

April 2, 1864

Feb. 13, 1864 Nov. 30, 1864 Sept. 29, 1863 Sept. 18, 1863 Nov. 28, 1863 April 30, 1864 Dec. 30, 1863 Nov. 28, 1863 Sept. 25, 1863 Aug. 19, 1864 Nov. 30, 1863 Aug. 27, 1863 Aug 30, 1864 March 3, 1864 Feb. 29, 1864 April 2, 1864 April 14, 1864 April 14, 1864 Sept. 21, 1863 May 20, 1865