Court Opinion

ID: 6925227
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2022-07-23 23:17:44.020601+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:08:21.510579
License: Public Domain

DUNIWAY, Circuit Judge
(concurring) .
I concur in the foregoing opinion, but I think that the case for affirmance is a little stronger than Judge MADDEN makes it appear.
I agree that such precedents as there are sustain the conclusion that at common law the liability here asserted did not exist. It follows that if there is any liability it must be based upon the statutes. My reading of those statutes leads me to believe that Congress, in enacting them, did put its mind on the question now before us and intended that the liability should be limited to whatever the United States can get for the vessel. It is true that section 409 states “it shall be the duty of the owner of such sunken craft to commence the immediate removal of the same, and prosecute such removal diligently, and failure to do so shall be considered as an abandonment of such craft, and subject the same to removal by the United States as provided for in sections 411-416, 418, and 502 of this title.” This clause follows the imposition of an obligation to mark the sunken vessel “until [it] * * * is removed or abandoned.” Thus, while the statute imposes the duty on the owner to remove, it also deals with what happens when he fails to remove, and specifies only that that failure is an abandonment of the craft and subjects it to removal by the United States.
If we then turn to the statutes dealing with removal by the United States, we find that there are two, sections 414 and 415. Section 414 deals with an obstruction by a sunken vessel, when the obstruction has existed for a longer period than thirty days, or when the abandonment of the vessel can be established in a lesser space of time. It provides that the vessel can be broken up, removed, sold or otherwise disposed of by the Secretary of the Army “without liability for any damage to the owners of the same.” This sentence then continues with four consecutive provisos. The first proviso authorizes a published notice “requiring the removal” of the vessel. The second proviso authorizes the Secretary to advertise for bids for the removal, this removal to be done “in case it has not in the meantime been so removed,” presumably by the owner; the contract can be conditioned to provide that the vessel and its cargo shall become the property of the contractor. The third proviso requires the contractor to give security. The fourth proviso states that any money received from the sale of any such wreck or under any contract for the removal of the wreck shall be covered into the Treasury of the United States. Thus, in section 414 Congress recognized the right of the owner to abandon the vessel, considered the possible liability of the government to the owner, and provided against such a liability, and also considered the possible recovery by the government of the cost, as to which it provided for such recovery either through payment by the contractor or through sale of the vessel. It did not provide for civil liability on the part of the owner or any one else if the moneys derived from the contractor or from the sale of the vessel were insufficient to pay the government’s costs.
The other section is section 415, which deals with emergencies. This section, after providing for the taking of immediate possession of the vessel and removing it, also contains two provisos which are a part of the same sentence. The first proviso again authorizes the giving of notice to the owner requiring him to remove it. The second proviso deals with the expense of removing, and says that it “shall be a charge against such craft and cargo; and if the owners thereof fail or refuse to reimburse the United States for such expenses within thirty days after notification, then the officer or agent aforesaid may sell the craft or cargo, or any part thereof that may not have been destroyed in removal, and the proceeds of such sale shall be covered into the Treasury of the United States.” It does not provide for liability on the part of the owner or anyone else if the proceeds of the sale are insufficient to pay the government’s costs. Thus, again, Congress *522provided for giving the owner an opportunity to remove, and specifically dealt with the expense of removal. It even expressly dealt with failure or refusal by the owner to reimburse the United States for such expense. The only remedy it provided was a sale of the craft or cargo, the proceeds to be covered into the Treasury. Surely the alternative of a remedy by suit against the owner for the amount of the expense could not have escaped the attention of the draftsmen, but they did not provide for it,
My views are reinforced by another statute. Section 412 makes a vessel used or employed in violating section 409 liable both for the pecuniary penalties specified in section 411, and in addition for the amount of damages done by it. The mode of recovery is “summarily by way of libel” against the vessel. Action in personam against the owner for damages is not provided for.
I think that these statutes demonstrate that Congress did consider the question now before us, that it was aware of the principle stated in The Manhattan, E.D. Pa., 1935, 10 F.Supp. 45, and quoted in Judge Madden’s opinion. That principle is that the owner has a right to abandon and thus absolve himself from liability, and its correlative is that the removal of a sunken vessel which is a menace to navigation is a public responsibility, the owner having suffered sufficient loss by the loss of a ship, once he abandons it. I therefore think that United States v. Republic Steel Corp., 1960, 362 U.S. 482, 80 S.Ct. 884, 4 L.Ed.2d 903, which did not involve a vessel, does not require a different result. Here the amount involved is large, and the owner is presumably fully able to pay it. But there are still many shipowners in this country, some of them very small businessmen indeed, such as fishermen, who own but one ship, who have all of their capital tied up in that ship, and to whom the loss of such a ship is an almost irreparable disaster. Imposition upon them of the cost of removing such a ship when it is sunk could make the disaster truly irreparable. I do not think that the Courts should invent such a result when the Congress has not provided for it. The matter should be left to the Congress, so that the conflicting interests involved can be heard and the relative merits of their varying positions can be evaluated, first by appropriate committees and then by the Congress as a whole. (See United States v. Standard Oil Co., 1947, 332 U.S. 301, 314-317, 67 S.Ct. 1604, 91 L.Ed. 2067).