claimants of the same class, had as just a right to the damages awarded by the judges for the loss of the use of the property, which had been destroyed or carried away by our troops, as to the original value of the said property; and the injustice of refusing to pay the latter would have been in no respect greater than was the injustice of refusing to pay the former; and that damages for the injury done to the claimants by the loss of the use and enjoyment of the property, during the many years that elapsed before its original value was repaid, are, under the law and usages of nations, as well as by the rules of common and civil law, as much a part of the satisfaction contemplated by the treaty as was the value of the property destroyed.

The sums due to these claimants, and awarded to them, as damages for the deprivation of the use of their property, have not been paid, solely in consequence of a decision of Mr. Woodbury, Secretary of the Treasury, made under a departmental usage in reference to domestic pecuniary demands.

That a treaty, being a contract between two independent nations, is to be controlled in its construction, not by the local usages of either, but by the universal rules of the international code, is too clear for argument. The committee believe that Mr. Woodbury would have taken this view of his duty in the premises if it had been presented to his attention. While the decision of Mr. Woodbury has not been reversed, the right of these claimants under the treaty to the payment of the awards of damage, under the name of interest, has not been denied by any Secretary of the Treasury who has acted upon the awards of the judges, or any Attorney General, since Mr. Woodbury's time, but has been expressly admitted by Secretaries Spencer, Bibb, Corwin and Forward, and by Attorneys General Crittenden and Cushing.

The Court of Claims, in deciding upon the cases of the claimants, also seem to admit their rights under the treaty, although regarding them as without remedy under the acts of Congress passed to give effect to the treaty, construed as those acts are by the Court of Claims, so as to give the Secretary of the Treasury an unlimited power to revise and reduce awards made in favor of individuals by the Florida judges. And that there is no appeal from the Secretary of the Treasury to any judicial tribunal, is settled by the opinion of the Supreme Court of the United States.

The claimants are now, therefore,,before the tribunal of Congress, which is uncontrolled by departmental usages or decisions, or by prior legislation, and which is now called upon to do justice, and cause the stipulations of the treaty of 1819 to be carried into effect.

If that treaty requires that the claimants should be indemnified for the loss of the use of their property, as well as for the loss of the original value of their property, the duty of this government to make such indemnification is not impaired by the erroneous and inadvertent decision of one of its executive officers. This government can never set up against the reclamations of Spain an adjudication by the Treasury Department manifestly in violation of the law of nations. In the case of the United States vs. The Schooner Peggy, 1 Cranch, 103, Chief Justice Marshall, in confirmation of this principle, said: "whatever

the decision of the court may be, the claim upon the nation, if unsatisfied, may still be asserted."

It has been much controverted in the history of these cases, whether the decisions of the Florida judges were judicial and final; and if not, to what extent a revising power was intended to be conferred upon the Secretary of the Treasury by the acts of Congress relating to the subject. The committee have not regarded it as necessary to enter into these controversies. It is sufficient that the original value of the property belonging to the claimants, for the destruction of which they are entitled to indemnity, has been settled by tribunals to which that duty was assigned by this government; that that original value has been admitted and paid at the treasury, after a careful revisal, with a deduction so slight that the substantial correctness of the decisions in Florida is not impeached, and that the only question which now remains relates to the duty of indemnifying the claimants for the loss of the use of their property. This duty, independently of the decisions of the Florida judges, your committee, for the reasons herein before given, regard as entirely clear.

The amount to be paid, if the views of the committee are correct, is large; but this cannot alter their substantial justice nor discharge the duty. If it is unjust, and in violation of the national faith to withhold the payment, the magnitude and evil consequences of this injustice and violation of national faith, and the hardships which result from them to individuals, are augmented in precise proportion to the amount withheld.

It is the interest of the United States, as a commercial nation, with property exposed to violence in every part of the world, to resist any charge or relaxation of the rule of public law, which prescribes, as the measure of indemnification for injuries to property, the restoration of its original value, together with compensation for the loss of its use. This government, which has always heretofore insisted upon this rule, cannot insist upon it hereafter as against others, if it shall finally decline to act upon the rule in these cases.

The committee, therefore, report a bill requiring the payment of that portion of the damages awarded by the judges, under the name of interest, so far as the original value awarded by the said judges has been approved at the Treasury Department, and recommend its passage.

The Committee on Claims, to whom was referred the case of George J. Knight, has looked into the same, and referring to reports heretofore made to the Senate and House of Representatives, in favor of the petitioner, which they adopt, the committee report a bill for the relief of the petitioner for the sum of fifteen hundred dollars.

IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, December 23, 1831.

The Committee on Naval Affairs, to whom was referred the petition of George J. Knight, make the following report:

The petitioner, previous to the month of May, 1814, was the owner of a schooner called the "Experiment," engaged in trade in the Chesapeake bay and its tributary waters, under the command of Captain George McDuell. He alleges that he gave strict orders to his captain not to do anything which would expose his vessel to capture by the British forces, which then infested the waters of the Chesapeake, nor to engage in any improper trade; that, while said vessel was proceeding on her voyage down the river Potomac, she was stopped by the commander of a small vessel-of-war of the United States, and taken into the public service as a look-out vessel; that said vessel was despatched by the commander of the United States vessel-of-war down the river Potomac to look out for British ships-of-war, which were said to be in that river; that, upon turning a point in the river, she suddenly came in view of a squadron of British ships; that the captain of said schooner endeavored to make his escape by running into Yeocomico creek, but, in doing so, the vessel grounded, and was next morning captured by the enemy's barges and burned; and the petitioner claims compensation for the vessel so captured and destroyed. At the time of these transactions the petitioner resided in the city of Baltimore, in the State of Maryland, and was engaged in mercantile transactions; but that, owing to this and many other heavy losses in trade, he was compelled to relinquish his business, and removed to the western part of the State of New York, and assumed the occupation of a farmer. That, at the time of the destruction of his vessel, a