Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 3.djvu/751



three commissioners, who shall receive, as compensation for the duties enjoined by the provisions of this act, two thousand dollars each, to be paid quarterly, from the treasury; who shall open an office for the adjudication of claims, at Pensacola, in the territory of West Florida, and St. king was a party, and which the United States adopted; and the grant was known to both parties to the treaty of cession. The United States were not deceived by the purchase, which they knew was subject to the claim of the petitioner, or those from whom he purchased; and they made no stipulation which should put it to a severer test than any other; and it was made to a house which, in consideration of its great and continued services to the king and his predecessor, had deservedly given them high claims as well on his justice as his faith. But if there could be a doubt that the evidence in the record did not establish the fact of a royal license or assent to this purchase, as a matter of specific and judicial belief, it would be presumed as a matter of law arising from the facts and circumstances of the case, which are admitted or unquestioned. Ibid. As decided by the Supreme Court, the law presumed the existence in the provinces of an officer authorized to make valid grants; a fortiori, to give license to purchase and to confirm; and the treaty designated the governor of West Florida as the proper officer to make grants of Indian lands by confirmation; as plainly as it does the governor of East Florida to make original grants, or the intendant of West Florida to grant royal lands. A direct grant from the crown, of lands in a royal haven may be presumed on an uninterrupted possession of sixty years; on a prescriptive possession of crown lands for forty years. The length of time which brings a given case within the legal presumption of a grant, charter or license, to validate a right long enjoyed, is not definite, depending on its peculiar circumstances. Ibid. Juan Percheman claimed two thousand acres of land lying in the territory of Florida, by virtue of a grant from the Spanish governor, made in 1815. His title consisted of a petition presented by himself to the governor of East Florida, praying for a grant of two thousand acres, at a designated place, in pursuance of the royal order of the 29th of March, 1815, granting lands to the military who were in St. Augustine during the invasion of 1812 and 1813; a decree by the governor, made 12th December, 1815, in conformity to the petition, in absolute property, under the authority of the royal order, a certified copy of which decree and of the petition was directed to be issued to him from the secretary’s office, in order that it may be to him in all events an equivalent of a title in form; a petition to the governor, dated 31st December, 1815, for an order of survey, and a certificate of a survey having been made on the 20th of August, 1819, in obedience to the same. This claim was presented, according to law, to the register and receiver of East Florida, while acting as a board of commissioners to ascertain claims and titles to lands in East Florida. The claim was rejected by the board, and the following entry made of the same. “In the memorial of the claimant to this board, he speaks of a survey made by authority in 1829. If this had been produced, it would have furnished some support for the certificate of Aguilar. As it is, we reject the claim.” Held, that this was not a final action on the claim, in the sense those words are used in the entitled “An act supplementary to,” &c. United States v. Percheman, 7 Peters, 51. A grant of land in Florida within the Indian boundary, by the governor, acting under the crown of Spain before the cession of Florida to the United States, was confirmed to the grantee, by the decree of the judge of the eastern district of Florida. The decree was affirmed on appeal. The United States v. Fernandez, 10 Peters, 303. The subject of grants of land within the Indian boundary, which had not by any official act been declared a part of the royal domain, was fully and ably considered in the case of Johnson v. M’Intosh, 8 Wheat. 543; 5 Cond. Rep. 515. Every European government claimed and exercised the right of granting lands, while in the occupation of the Indians. Ibid. The grants of lands in the possession of the Indians by the governor of Florida, under the crown of Spain, were good to pass the right of the crown. The grants severed them from the royal domain, so that they became private property; which was not ceded to the United States by the treaty with Spain. Ibid. The Supreme Court cannot attach any condition to a grant of absolute property in the whole of the land. This grant was made by the governor of East Florida in absolute property, with a promise of a title in form. He was the exclusive judge of the conditions to be imposed on his grant, and of their performance. The United States v. Segui, 10 Peters, 306. A grant of land by the governor of East Florida, in consideration of services to the Spanish government, made before the cession of the territory of Florida to the United States, confirmed. The United States v. Chaires, 10 Peters, 308. Under a grant of the governor of Florida, prior to the cession of the same to the United States, of sixteen thousand acres of land, for the purpose of erecting a water-mill, a survey of five hundred and twenty acres was made; and at another place, a survey of fifteen thousand six hundred and thirty acres was also made. The Supreme Court held, that the first survey of five hundred and twenty acres was valid, and that the survey of fifteen thousand four hundred and eighty acres was invalid; but that the grantee has a title to the fifteen thousand four hundred and eighty acres of vacant land; which he has a right to have surveyed, adjoining the survey of five hundred and twenty acres. The United States v. Seton, 10 Peters, 309. Under a Spanish grant of five miles square, ten thousand acres were surveyed at one place, and six thousand acres were surveyed at another place, as the whole quantity of ungranted land could not be found together. The grant was confirmed. The United States v. Sibbald, 10 Peters, 313. A grant of land was made by governor Coppinger, in June, 1828. The grant was made to the appellee, on his stating his intention to build a saw-mill. The decree grants to the petitioner “license to construct a water-saw mill, on the creek known by the name of Pottsburg, bounded by the lands of Strawberry hill, and his tract not being sufficient, I grant him the equivalent quantity in Cedar Swamp about a mile east of M’Queen’s mill, but with the precise condition that, as long as he does not erect said machinery, this grant will be considered null, and without value nor effect until that event takes