Page:United States Reports, Volume 60.djvu/18

2 collect the tax levied by the ordinance of 1852 was lost by the repeal of that ordinance under the 5th condition of the 2d section of the acts of the Legislature of March 15, 1854, page 78, authorizing the city of New Orlcans to subscribe to the Opelousas and Jackson railroads. This position was taken under the authority of the principles recognised in three decisions: one in the case of Cooper v. Hodge, 17 L., 476, and two others referred to in that decision. Judge Martin was the organ of the court in these three cases. In that of Cooper v. Hodge, the principle is expressed in this form:

“We have held, that if o judgment be correctly given under a law which is repealed pending the appeal, this court is bound to reverse it.”

The Supreme Court of the United States have acted on this principle in cases of much more difficulty than that now before the court.

The Legislature of Virginia, by an act passed in 1779, during the war, had authorized Virginia debtors of British subjects to discharge the debt by payment into an office existing under the State Government. The defendants in error, under this act, had paid into this office a portion of their indebtedness to the plaintiffs, and pleaded their discharge pro tanto under the act. The plaintiffs replied the 4th article of the definitive treaty of peace between Great Britain and the United States, of September 3, 1783, in which it was stipulated that creditors on either side should meet with no lawful impediment to the recovery of the full value in sterling money of all bona fide debts heretofore contracted.

The State was held to have had full power to make the law, but it had been annulled by the treaty, and the defendants in error were liable to the full amount, notwithstanding partial payment to the State.

1 Cranch, 103. The United States v. The Schooner Peggy. The schooner Peggy was captured by a United States armed vessel, and libelled as prize, ordered to be restored by the District Court, condemned by the Circuit Court on appeal as lawful prize, when the owners of the Peggy prosecuted a writ of error to the Supreme Court. She had been captured as sailing under the authority of the French Republic. On the 30th of September, 1801, pending the writ of error, a convention was signed between the United States and the French Republic, and was ratified on the 21st of December, 1801, which provided for the restoration of property captured, but not yet definitively condemned.

It was urged that the court could take no notice of the stipulation for the restoration of property not yet definitively