Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1870-05-07
IorEToIAL.
SUPREME COURT DECISIONS.
Nashville, December Term, 1853
Thomas HI. Coldwell, Attorney
General and Reporter.


G. F. Robertson vs. II. R. Shores.
| This is an action brought by Shore
against Robertson upon promissory note:
Judgment was rendered in the Circui
Court in favor of the plaintiff Shores.
There was some evidence upon the iris
tending to show that the consideration
for which the notes were given was Con
federate money.
The Circuit Judge instructed the Jury
that if the transactions in which the note
were given, was in the ordinary and nee
essary business of life and not for specu
lation, and that at the time of the tran
saction, Confederate notes were the only
general circulating paper or money, ant
that, either from compulsion or necessity
such notes were so used in transacting the
common and ordinary business OF
life; and if the parties esteemed
| or attached a value to the Con.
federate notes; then they should find g
verdict for the plaintiff for the value so
attached with interest.
The effect which should be given TO
Confederate Treasury notes as the con-
considered by this court, that it would
seem superfluous to add more upon the
subject, had not the recent case of
ThoringtOn VS.. Smith, decided by the Su-
preme Court of the United States, held a
doctrine differing from that heretofore
announced by this court. It was held in
that case that a contract made in the
State of Alabama during the late rebel
lion, for the payment of Confederate
Treasury notes was valid contract, which
might be enforced in the courts of the
United States; and that the party, entitled
by the terms of the contract TO receive
Confederate dollars, could recover their
actual value at the time and place of the
contract, in lawful money of the United
States.
That this currency was unlawfully
created and issued by a treasona-
bic organization, and for an I'M
lawful and reasonable purpose,
is undeniable, and is not denied in
the decision just alluded to. 1t created
no valid contract between the organiza-
ton issuing it and the parties receiving it,
and whether considered as money, or as
promise by the quasi Rebel government
to pay money, was wholly illegal and
void. We do not base our decision upon
the assumption that a currency issued in
violation of law, or without authority of
law, has thereby, such character of il
legality impressed upon it, that it would
necessarily be violation of law to pass
it, or to deal in it. Cases might perhaps
exist in which securities illegally issued
might be held void as the consideration of
a contract, and yet parties be guilty of no
offence against law or public policy in
paying them or accepting them, if they
thought it for their interest to do so.
We do not say that if the Rebel authori-
ties during the late rebellion had coined
and issued gold, in aid of the rebel
lion, or had bartered cotton or other
property for the same purpose, such gold
or other property would thereby have had
impressed upon it such illegal character
that it could not subsequently be dealt in
as merchandise. But however that may
be, any agreement for the delivery of such
gold or other property made for the pur-
pose of aiding the rebellion, would have
been illegal, without respect to the illegal
origin of the property, and as every man
must be held to intend the necessary con-
sequences of his own acts, if the delivery
of, or dealing in a particular currency,
must necessarily and directly tend to aid
the rebellion, such dealing or delivery
must be held TO be illegal, without inquiry
as to the actual purpose of the parties to
hn hn in
this case is, therefore, whether the deal
ing in Confederate currency, and the
treating of it as money in the ordinary
transactions of business between citizens,
necessarily and directly tended to
aid the rebellion. If such was the
tendency, such acts were illegal,
and all contracts for the performance
of such acts void. The fact that the cur,
rency was issued under the authority
claimed by a Government of paramount
force, controlling the territory where the
took place, cannot, in my
opinion, make any difference.
Whatever might be the right and obi
cations of citizens of portion of our
territory in the temporary occupation of
a recognized, sovereign, belligerent pow
er, as was the case with the town of
Castine during the last war with Great
Britain, the occupation and control of
territory by the late Rebel forces and au-
did not operate to make lawful
voluntary acts of hostility against the
United States on the part of citizens of
such territory.
Rebel coercion may relieve the act from
its criminal character, but voluntary act
in aid of the rebellion was not lawful,
though committed within territory under
the control and in the occupation of the
Rebel forces.
The Rebel Government was not gov
ernment dc factO in such a sense that
allegiance was due to it, or that voluntary
acts in aid of it were lawful.
Were the passing and dealing in the
Rebel currency, acts so directly and materi-
ally in aid of the Rebellion that the courts
are required to consider and treat them as
and as contrary to the policy of
The law of the United States? This Court
has heretofore held that they were, y
1t is not necessary, in order to hold
such acts unlawful, that we should say
hat they were in themselves acts of |
treason against the United States. 1t is |
if they were acts tending directly |
% the disadvantage of the rightful gov
and which it is contrary to the |
policy of that government to support and |
uphold.
This currency was the life blood of the |
and the war could not have |
been carried on for any considerable
ength of time without the support turn- |
shed by it. The success of the Rebel |
ion depended in great measure upon !
he ability of the Rebel author.
ties TO sustain the credit OF |
heir currency. Such credit as it bad,
,nabled them to maintain the war while |
{ was maintained, and the collapse of |
his currency was one important reason |
hat the war ended when it did.
This currency consisted of promises on
he part of the COnfederacy to pay money |
n the future. 1t had no intrinsic value,
md its value and availability as q currency |
depended wholly upon the chances of
uccess of the usurping power which
ssucd 1t. 1t was, by the terms of every |
tote, payable only upon the expiration of |
tx months after the ratification of treaty |
If peace between the Confederate States
nd the United States. The intended, and
he actual effect of the issuance and circu-
alton of this currency, was to make every
a stakeholder in the Confede-
acy, and directly interested to the extent
If his investment, to secure the ultimate
uCCeSS of the Rebel cause
That this was regarded as a matter of
PRACTICAL importance to the Con-
ederacy, and not a theory merely,
l. IL L - E.