Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/419

 412 PEDEBAIi BSFOBTEIC. �the Jurisdictîon are that the contract for repairing the scows is not a maritime contract; that the scova are not ships or vessels; that they are adapted to use only in port, and not upon the high seas, and that if they are ships or vessels this court has no jurisdiction of a suit in personavi for repairs fur- nished to a domestic vessel. In The General Smith, 4 Wheat. 438, it was held that a material man has no maritime lien on a domestic ship, but the court said: "No doubt is entertained by this court that the admiralty rightfully possesses a gen- erai jurisdiction in cases of material men, and if this had been a suit in personam there would not have been any hesi- tation in sustaining the jurisdiction of the district court." Id. 433. Although this dictum was strenuously objected to by one of the justices of the same court in Ramsay v. Allegre, 12 Wheat. 611, 614, it has been repeatedly reafBrmed by the supreme court, and it can no longer be questioned, that a contract for furnishing supplies or repairs to a domestic vessel is in its nature a maritime contract, and that a suit in personam thereon is within the jurisdiction of the admiralty, The St. Lawrence, 1 Blateh. 529, and cases cited; The Lotta- wanna, 21 Wall. 558. �In the case last cited the court says : "It seems to be set- tled in our jurisprudence that, so long as congress does not interpose to regulate the aubject, the rights of material men, furnishing necessaries to a vessel in her home port, may be regulated in each state by state legislation. State laws, it is true, cannot exclude the contract for furnishing such neces- saries from the domain of admiralty jurisdiction, for it is a maritime contract, and they cannot alter the limita of that jurisdiction, " etc. Id. 579-80. "But the district courts of the United States, having jurisdiction of the contract aa a mari- time one, may enforce liens, given for its security, even when created by the state laws." Id. 580. The case of Cumiing- hamv. Hall, 1 Cliff. 43, 47, is cited as sustaining the proposi- tion that there is no distinction, as regards the jurisdiction between a contract for building a ship, which is held to be not maritime, and a contract for furnishing repairs to a ship ����