Case ID: us-ct-cl_36/html/0581-02.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "■ Mr. Justice Harlan", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

JOHN GLAVEY v. THE UNITED STATES.
    [35 C. Cls. R., 242; 182 U. S. R., 595.]
    
      On the claimants Appeal.
    
    A local inspector receives notice from the Secretary of the Treasury that he is appointed under the Act August 7, 1882 (22 Stat. L., 346, sec. 2), a special inspector of foreign steam vessels, to serve without additional compensation, in connection with his appointment as local inspector of hulls of steam vessels, the appointment to take effect on taking the oath. He takes the oath and enters upon the discharge of his duties. He is not required to give bond, nor does he offer to give the bond required by law, and he serves over three years, during which time he makes no demand for salary, nor any protest or objection. The Secretary of the Treasury, in his report for 1889, states that these offices are sinecures, and that the services of three offices have been dispensed with, that held by the claimant being one of them. But Congress do not repeal the law until the Act March 1, 1895. (25 Stat. L., 699.)
    The court below decides:
    ' 1. A conditional appointment confers no title to an office.
    2. An official oath is an incident to the discharge of the duties imposed and does not in itself constitute him who takes it an officer de jure.
    
    3. An officer defacto can not recover the salary of the office.
    4. Where an office is accepted in connection with the duties of another office under an appointment which states that it carries no compensation and is held for some years without protest, thereby misleading the appointing authority and subsequently salary is demanded, it will be deemed a fraud in fact and in law.
    5. Acquiescence and waiver are always questions of fact and operate in analogy to estoppel.
    6. The Government may invoke the doctrines of acquiescence and waiver in claims for salary.
    7. The Act May 1, 1864 (23 Stat. L., 17), which provides that “hereafter no Department or officer of the United States shall accept voluntary service for the Government,” applies only to employees of the Indian Office.
   The decision of the court below is reversed on the ground that the stipulation that the claimant, who was local inspector, should exercise the functions of his office of special inspector of foreign steam vessels “without additional compensation” was invalid under the statute prescribing the salary he should receive, was against public policy, and imposed no legal obligation upon him; and that the mere failure of the appointee to demand, his salary as such officer until after he had ceased to be local inspector was not in law a waiver of his right to the compensation fixed by the statute.

■ Mr. Justice Harlan

delivered the opinion of the Supreme Court May 27, 1901.

The Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Brown, Mr. Justice Peck ham, and Mr. Justice McKenna dissented.