Case ID: us-ct-cl_28/html/0557-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Mr. Chief Justice Fuller", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

“THE OLD SETTLERS,” OR WESTERN CHEROKEE INDIANS v. THE UNITED STATES.
    (27 C. Cls. R., 1; 148 U. S. R., 427.)
    
      On both parties’ Appeal.
    
    Congress refer the claims to this court with jurisdiction to determine what money is due to the claimants “arising from or groxoing out of treaty stipxilatioxis and acts of Coxigress” xoith “xmx-estx-icted latilxidein adjxisting axid detexmiining the said claims so that the rights, legal and equitable, both of the Uxiited States and of said Indians, may be fully considered and detexmiined,” and with power “ to try and detex'mixie all qxiestions that may ax-ise ixi such caxise on behalf of either party The claimants seek to establish the fact that the treaty of 1846 was procured by fraud and duress. The other questions of controversy grow out of the construction of this treaty.
    Tbe court below decides:
    1. Congress can confer upon this court powers not strictly judicial, such as those of a quasi international tribunal; but when its judgment may be reviewed in the Supreme Court, its decision must be confined to the legal rights of the parties.
    2. The “uxiresbrxctedlatitude” given by the Westex-xi Cherolcee Aet, 25th February, 1889 (25 Stat. L., p. 694), does not authorize the court to go behind a treaty and declare it to have been procured by duress or fraud.
    3. The purpose of the Cherolcee Tx-eaty, 1846 (9 Stat. L., p. 871), was that the Western Cherokees should surrender their separate sovereignty, and sell an undivided two-thirds of their lands in the Indian Territory in consideration of one-third of the price which had been paid to the Eastern Cherokees under the treaty of New Echota for lands east of the Mississippi.
    4. When a treaty reserves a disputed question, and provides that it shall be “submitted to the Senate of the Uxiited States for its decision,’' the decision is as obligatory as the treaty itself,
    5. The statute regulating the recovery of interest in suits against the Government (Rev. Stat., § 1091) does not extend to a case coming into this court under a special act and resting on a treaty which provides for the payment of interest.
    6. Sovereignties, corporations and individuals or aggregations of individuals may be parties litigant. The Western Cherokees are not a body politic or corporate; but, as the former owners of communal property, are now severally interested in a common fund. Concerning such litigants equity takes jurisdiction, to prevent a multiplicity of suits; one may sue for the benefit of all.
    
      7. A census is not a record -winch imparts absolute verity.
    8. When a treaty makes the United States the trustee of a fund, and charges them with the cost, risk, and responsibility of distribution, the court will decree concerning an unpaid balance that the Government shall continue to act as trustee, and shall pay the balance to the individuals entitled to the fund as ascertained under a provision of the treaty.
    Tbe decision of tbe court below is affirmed on tbe same grounds, except as two items, tbe Supreme Court “concurring substantially in tbe conclusions reached by tbe Court of Claims.”
   Mr. Chief Justice Fuller

delivered tbe opinion of tbe Supreme Court, April 3, 1893.