As this Court has decided at the present term (
see the
preceding case of
Allen v. Newberry) that a contract of
affreightment between ports and places within the same state is not
the subject of admiralty jurisdiction, so it now decides that a
contract for supplies furnished to a vessel engaged in such a trade
is subject to the same limitation.
A rule in admiralty, adopted at the present term, takes from the
district courts the right of proceeding
in rem against a
domestic vessel for supplies and repairs, which had been assumed
upon the authority of a lien given by state laws.
The reason of the rule explained.
Page 62 U. S. 249
This was a case in admiralty, which arose in this way:
C. K. & William Garrison supplied the steamer Goliah with
coal, and then assigned the claim to Card. The lien held by the
Garrisons was created by the local law of California, sec. 317,
576, Compiled Laws. The claimant excepted to the libel, on the
ground that the libellant was but the assignee of those with whom
the contract was made by the master of the vessel, and that he had
no lien. The district court overruled this exception, and gave
judgment in favor of the libellant; and this judgment was affirmed
by the circuit court, on appeal. The vessel was engaged in trade
exclusively within the State of California.
MR. JUSTICE NELSON delivered the opinion of the Court.
This suit was a proceeding
in rem against the Goliah,
to recover the balance of an account for coal furnished the steamer
while lying at the port of the city of Sacramento, in the months of
October and November, 1855. The vessel, according to the averments
in the libel, and which are not denied in the record,
Page 62 U. S. 250
was engaged in the business of navigation and trade on the
Sacramento River, exclusively within the State of California, and,
of course, between ports and places of the same state. She was
therefore engaged, at the time of the contract in question, in the
purely internal commerce of the state, the contract relating
exclusively to that commerce, and which does not in any way affect
trade or commerce with other states.
The Court has held, in the case of
Allen v. Newberry,
at this term, that a contract of affreightment between ports and
places within the same state was not the subject of admiralty
jurisdiction, as it concerned the purely internal trade of a state,
and that the jurisdiction belonged to the courts of the state. That
case occurred upon Lake Michigan, within waters upon which the
jurisdiction of the court was regulated by the Act of Congress of
26 February, 1845, but the restriction of the jurisdiction by that
act was regarded by the court as but declaratory of the law, and
that it existed independently of that statute.
The contract in that case, as we have said, was one of
affreightment between ports of the same state, but we perceive no
well founded distinction between that and a contract for supplies
furnished the vessel engaged in such a trade. They both concern
exclusively the internal commerce of the state, and must be
governed by the same principles.
There certainly can be no good reason given for extending the
jurisdiction of the admiralty over this commerce. From the case of
Gibbon v.
Ogden, 9 Wheat. 194, down to the present time, it
has been conceded by this Court that, according to the true
interpretation of the grant of the commercial power in the
Constitution to Congress, it does not extend to or embrace the
purely internal commerce of a state, and hence that commerce is
necessarily left to the regulation under state authority. To
subject it, therefore, to the jurisdiction in admiralty, would be
exercising this jurisdiction simply in the enforcement of the
municipal laws of the state, as these laws, under the conceded
limitation of the commercial power, regulate the subject as
completely as Congress does commerce
Page 62 U. S. 251
"with foreign nations, and among the several states." We are
speaking of that commerce which is completely internal, and which
does not extend to or affect other states, or foreign nations.
We have at this term amended the 12th rule of the admiralty, so
as to take from the district courts the right of proceeding
in
rem against a domestic vessel for supplies and repairs which
had been assumed upon the authority of a lien given by state laws,
it being conceded that no such lien existed according to the
admiralty law, thereby correcting an error which had its origin in
this Court in the case of
The Gen.
Smith, 4 Wheat. 439, applied and enforced in the
case of
Peyroux v. Howard &
Varion, 7 Pet. 324, and afterwards partially
corrected in the case of
The Steamboat New Orleans v.
Phelbus, 11 Pet. 175,
36 U. S. 184.
In this last case, the court refused to enforce a lien for the
master's wages, though it had been given by the local laws of the
State of Louisiana, the same as in the case of supplies and repairs
of the vessel. We have determined to leave all these liens
depending upon state laws, and not arising out of the maritime
contract, to be enforced by the state courts.
So in respect to the completely internal commerce of the states,
which is the subject of regulation by their municipal laws;
contracts growing out of it should be left to be dealt with by its
own tribunals.
For these reasons, we think the decree of the court below should
be
Reversed, and the cause remitted with directions to dismiss
the libel.
MR. JUSTICE WAYNE dissented.