Case ID: us-ct-cl_15/html/0246-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Hunt, J.,", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

PARSONS'S CASE.
    Maurice K. Parsons v. The United States.
    
      On the Proofs.
    
    
      The claimant sells and delivers beef to an Indian agent. The usual voucher is given, audited, and allowed. Payment, however, is refused by the Treasury on the ground that the appi'opriaiion out of xvhieh the claim was payable has lapsed and the balanee been covered into the Treasury.
    
    The absence of an appropriation constitutes no bar to tbe recovery of a judgment in cases where tbe liability of tbe government bas been established.
    
      The Reporters’ statement of tbe case:
    Tbe facts of this case sufficiently appear in tbe opinion of tbe court.
    
      Mr. B. P. Grafton for tbe claimant.
    
      Mr. Assistant Attorney-General Simons for tbe defendants..
   Hunt, J.,

delivered tbe opinion of tbe court:

There is no defense to tbe claimant’s demand upon tbe merits; and we are givái to understand that it would have been paid without resorting to this suit if tbe appropriation out of which it was payable bad not lapsed and tbe balance been covered into tbe Treasury under tbe provisions of § 3691 of tbe Revised Statutes.

This court bas held repeatedly that tbe absence of an appropriation constitutes no bar to tbe recovery of a judgment in cases where tbe liability of tbe government bas been established (Briggs’s Case, Collins’s Case, ante, pp. 22, 48.)

Tbe counsel for tbe government very properly yields to tb deliberate views of tbe court repeatedly expressed on this subject, and we find no difficulty in giving judgment in favor of tbe claimant.

It is therefore ordered, adjudged, and decreed that there b judgment in favor of tbe claimant for tbe sum of $4,141.33.