United States v. Herron

ERROR to the Circuit Court for the District of Louisiana; the case being thus:

The Bankrupt Act of 1867-which in its general outlines, as in many of its details, follows (as did prior Bankrupt Acts of the United States passed in 1800 and 1841), the British Bankrupt Acts enacts that a discharge duly granted under the act shall, with the exceptions of debts created by the fraud or embezzlement of the bankrupt or by his defalcation as a public officer, or while acting in any fiduciary character, 'release the bankrupt from all debts, claims, liabilities, and demands which were or might have been proved against his estate in bankruptcy, and may be pleaded. . . as a full and complete bar to all suits brought on any such debts, claims, liabilities, or demands.'

Under the act the United States may prove its debt, and it has a priority given to it by the act. But it is not mentioned by name as among the creditors whose debts will be released by the certificate which the act authorizes.

This statute being in force the United States brought suit on a bond executed by one Collins, as principal, and Herron and others as sureties. Herron pleaded a discharge under the said Bankrupt Act, and the question, of course, was whether a discharge under the act barred a debt due to the government.

The court below thought that it did, and gave judgment in favor of Herron, whereupon the government brought the case here.

Mr. C. H. Hill, Assistant Attorney-General, for the United States:

It is a familiar principle that no general words-not even 'the most general that can be devised'-divest the sovereign of his rights or remedies. Nothing short of specific and express words can do it. This was old law, in Coke's day, and was asserted by him as such in the Magdalen College Case. It has been just assumed by this court, in the Dollar Savings Bank v. United States, as plain and as equally applicable to this government,. . . 'applied frequently in the different States, and practically in the Federal courts.' The same thing had been decided years ago by this court in United States v. Knight.

Applying the principle to the exact matter of the Bankrupt Acts, it has been held from the days of Atkyns down, in Great Britain (from whose Bankrupt Acts all ours have been in the main derived,) as a matter undeniable, that debts due the crown were not barred by a discharge under the acts.

And the same was decided three-quarters of a century ago, in our own country, in the case of United States v. King, in the Circuit Court of the United States as then organized under the Judiciary Act of Mr. Admas; an able tribunal, composed of Mr. Justice Tilghman, afterwards eminent as chief justice of Pennsylvania; Mr. Justice Griffith, one of the most honored lawyers of New Jersey; and Mr. Justice Bassett, well known in the annals of Delaware.

The matter in short is too perfectly settled and plain for more argument. The error of court below is palpable.

No opposing counsel.

Mr. Justice CLIFFORD delivered the opinion of the court.