Case ID: us-ct-cl_40/html/0522-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

JOSHUA BISHOP v. THE UNITED STATES.
    [38 C. Cls. R., 473; 197 U. S. R., 334.]
    
      On the claimant's Affeal.
    
    An act refers the claim of an officer in the Navy for “ alleged items of pay ” with jurisdiction to try the case, and provides that the statute of limitations shall not apply to it. The main issue involved is whether if a court-martial was legal in its organization and in the proceedings which resulted in the dismissal of the claimant from the Navy, the statute conferring jurisdiction creates any liability on the part óf the Government.
    The court below decides:
    1. An act which refers a claim to this court with jurisdiction to try the case and a waiver of the statute of limitations leaves the cause of action precisely as it would have been if suit had been brought within six years from the time when the claim first accrued.
    2. Where such an act speaks of the claimant as a “ lieutenant-commander ” in the Navy, the words are simply descriptive. It is not a concession by Congress that he was in law or in fact an officer in the naval service during the period of his dismissal.
    
      3. While tlie judicial action of the President in passing upon the sentence of a court-martial can not he delegated, he may avail himself of the services of a subordinate officer to aid him in the consideration of the proceedings and sentence.
    4. The personal knowledge of the President of the facts disclosed by the record will be inferred from the terms of his approval. Where he wrote on an abstract of the case “Approved ” with his signature, and the Secretary of the Navy notified the officer that the sentence had been approved by the President, the personal action of the President will be inferred.
    5. It is not necessary that the officer who convenes a court-martial shall approve or disapprove the sentence of the court in a case where the action of the President is required by law.
    G. Where a court-martial on a foreign station is composed of the rnini- . mum number of officers, it will be assumed that the officer who convened the court properly exercised his discretion, if nothing to the contrary appears on the face of the order.
    7. Where an officer was suspended from duty for a few hours, was restored to duty, was subsequently arrested and court-mar-tialed, his suspension can not be regarded as punishment for the same offense.
    8. An officer in 1807 was not entitled to sea pay after being detached from his vessel on a foreign station and ordered to report to the Secretary of the Navy.
   The decision of the court below is affirmed on the same grounds.

Mr. Justice Brown delivered the opinion of the Supreme Court April 3,1905.