Page:United States Reports, Volume 2.djvu/175

. Surname Comer or Pm%·lv¤nia» 16g the aéts of Co¤gr¢, and the Legillature. The Marlhall had 17gz. returned to the judge, that he had the goods and money ready liv`.! to be delivered to the captors, or their agent ; and this was held to amount to a written promife, to pay the fame to the plainti8§ Hmduyon, as agent of the l`eamen."‘ The two cates are not analogous; they pollefs rlillinét pro- rninent features: In the former cafe, there was no queltion, who were the captors, or how the booty was to be divided ; _ 'there were no difcordant decrees of different marine Courts g no difpute refpeéting the conftitutional powers of the judica- ture, which pronounced the {ina} decree. · · Here they all fully exilt; and a common Law Court at Lairmf = rrr, was called ou, to carry into execution the decree of the Court of Appeals, againlt the executors of the State judge, and in de- rogation of the. decxee he had given, l`ané`tioned· by the verdiét of a ury. _ - On the {rf point, it is not elllmrially necellary to give au opinion, w ether, if the refolve of Cougr¢ had been abfolurc and `imperatiw, iullead of being barely remmmmdstory, as to the elias blilhment of Courts o£ Admiralty in the different itates, and the laws of any one State had been repugnant thereto, fueh re- folution would be fupreme, and controul the law of the imlivia dual State 1 Nor {hall I attempt to deline the former powers of Com gr;/i, by fixing how far they reached, rmtcnbr to the confedera- _ tion; which was {ent to the ·dill·`erent States for ratification on · the 17th- Nov. 1777, and finally acceded to by Maqlund on the c tit of Mm-rl: 178 rt I am, however, compelled to fay, that the powers of Congnji mult- neccifarily be fuppofed to have been cp-extenlive with the great objeéts which America then had in _ view, and competent to proteét and advance the united interelts bf the whole. It is fuflicient in my idea, -for the decilion of the cafe before us, to obfcrve, that the prefent Init relting on the judgment in Lanrq/for county as its balis, if the then plaintifa were not legally entitled 'to recorer againlt the executors of Mr. Georg: Ro/Ir, the aétion now before the Court is not fultainabler 3 Term Rep. 3774 I have only to add, that it. would alfo have afforded me much plcafure, if this argument had been condufted before the Judges of the Sgqwemr Court of the. [hired Serie:. ` We formerly indulged ourfelves with hopes of it, when the jury were difcharged in an aétion between the now plaintiffs and Horne: Loaming, in rgrununry term lalt, when the fame points came in queition. e may be tonfudered, in fome remote dc- gree, as parties in the prefent fuit,aad the decilion of the Federal judges would probably have given more general fatisfaétiona But the parties have iuliited on our opinion; and we are bound Y to The call: of Ross. cm!. Exenutors ta. Riuenbuusc has been inferred, by- mtilake, cliche term w!·:::_itw:: argued, not when it was decided.
 * See the cafe of Henrirrson v. CYr:r}:oon, here alluded to, post, l74•

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