Court Opinion

ID: 8864004
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-11-26 17:58:45.771174+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:05:55.991285
License: Public Domain

PARLANGE, District Judge
(after stating the facts as above). Whatever right of action the appellees may have arises from the refusal or failure of the collector of customs to issue papers to the tug, after Thornton had disclosed the persons for whom he was trustee, and not from the action of the collector in withdrawing the papers in which Thornton was described as trustee, without indication of the person or persons for whom he was trustee. The with*547drawn! of the papers was lawful. , Counsel for the appellees assert in their brief that this is a possessory action. They insist that “this is a suit for the recovery of a vessel, and not of the papers,” and also that: “Even if it were a suit for the papers, we think that it would have been maintainable, because the papers were an essential part of the vessel, and, as such, maritime property, and, under the authorities cited, a libel lies for possession of maritime property.” All the authorities cited on the brief for the appellees were cases in which seizures of vessels had been made by marshals, sheriffs, or other officers, and in which the possession of the owners had been ousted. In the present case the possession of the owners was not ousted. There was no seizure by the collector of customs. The owners resorted to the proceeding of causing the seizure of their tug, which, at the time of the seizure by their own process, they were operating under an agreement with the collector of customs. Virtually, the object sought to be accomplished by the action was to compel the collector of customs to issue papers to the tug, or to enable the tug to navigate without papers. The counsel for the appellees assert that the claim for damages is incidental. We are unable to discover in an action thus brought any ground for admiralty jurisdiction. We are clear that, where a collector of customs refuses merely to issue papers to a vessel, a possessory action in admiralty will not lie, although the vessel may have been temporarily prevented from navigating as the result of the collector’s nonaction. The lower court had no jurisdiction of the cause. The decree appealed from is reversed, and the cause is remanded to the lower court, with the, direction to sustain the plea to the jurisdiction and to dismiss the cause.