The Newtown bee., 1888-06-15
The French Spoliation Claims.

The delays of Congress i'll the matter of these claims would cause even the English courts of chancery ill the days of Dickens to blush with shame. For over so years has Congress, by delays and counter delays, by neglect which amounts to confiscation of private property to pub
 lie use without compensation, allowed these just claims of creditors against the
 United States to be prosecuted to no eff feet. Charles Sumner, in the United
 States Senate, spoke of the character of these claims as follows: ''Of all claims
 in our history, these are most associated
 with great events and great sacrifices.
 First in time, they are also first in char acter, for they spring from the very
 cradle of the republic and the trials of it's infancy. To comprehend them, you
 must know, first, how independence was
 won; and, secondly, how, at a later day, peace was assured. Other claims have
 been merely personal or litigious; these are historic. Here were individual loss es, felt at the time most keenly and con l stituting an unanswerable claim upon l France, which were employed by our 1 government at critical moment, like
 credit or cash in hand, to purchase re- lease from outstanding national obliga-
 tions, so that the whole country became, | at once, the trustee of these sufferers,
 bound. of course, to gratitude for the
 means thus contributed, but bound also | to indemnify them against these losses. | And vet these sufferers, thus unique in
 situation, have been compelled to see all
 other claims for foreign spoliations satis-
 fled, while they alone have been turned
 away. In all other cases,
 there has been simply a claim for foreign spoliations, but without any superad-
 ded obligation on the part of our govern
 ic n al i'm for fnraipn Snnli-
 ations, the precise counterpart of all oth-
 CT claims, but with a superadded Obliga-
 tion, on the part of our government, in
 the nature of debt, constituting an as
 sumpsit or implied promise to pay; so
 that these sufferers are not merely claim
 ants on account of French SpoliatiOns, but they are also creditors on account of
 plain assumption by the government ot
 the undoubted liability of France. The
 appeal of these claimant creditors is en
 hanced beyond the pecuniary interests : involved. when we consider the nature o1 this assumption and especially that il this way our country obtained final re lease from embarrassing stipulation;
 with France contracted in the war fol , national independence. Regarding it l therefore, as a debt, it constitutes part of that sacred debt incurred for nationa ! independence and is the only part re
 malnluS unpaid.
 The act of January 20, 1885, sending d the claims to the court of claims, while ,. the third that has passed both houses O e Congress, is the first that has received
 the approval of a president, one beins !. vetoed by President Polk, another b, 2 President Pierce, while this, the third ' was signed by President Arthur. By vii z tue of this act, sscitizens of the Unitet 2 States or their legal representatives, T having valid claims to indemnity upo ;. !. the French government arising out of il ; legal captures, detentions, seizures, con
 demnations and confiscations ssprior t the ratification of the convention of 180 l. with France, may apply to the court 0
 claims, which court is given power in tn q same act to "eXamine and determine tn Il 1 validity and amount of such claims an ii report to Congress.
 e About 5000 of these claims have bee U filed in this court and, after most eS . haustive trial of several causes which il . volve the important questions in tn Y cases, the Chief Justice and all the judge ; concurred in the opinion, in these severa J cases, that, as conclusion of law, thes II several claimants have valid claim t J indemnity upon the French governmen y prior to the ratification of the eonventio ' between the United States and the Frenc U Republic, concluded on the Both day 0
 September, 1900, and that the claim
 were relinquish9d to France by the gov
 ernment of the United States by sai 7. treaty in part consideration of the reliI s punishment of certain national claims 0 q France against the United States. Thes e decisions were reported to Congress b ,. the court in December, 1886, since whic e time Congress has failed, not by reaso tt of opposition, but because of neglect, t IS take any definite action in the matter 1- The bill to appropriate the necessar n amount lies on the table of the U. s. Ser IT ate, while the august body is engaged i d filibustering over the subject of what l. to be done with the surplus in the Unite v States treasury. Would it not be bette V for an honest government to first pay tn Il obligation which it's own court deter q mines was used as an offset against tn e claims of France, incurred by our failur 2 to keep the treaty by which the aid C is France was procured and by which tn t independence of the United States va $ secured . Justice.