1. The doctrine of the case of
<|7 Wall. 463|>United
States v. Adams, 7 Wall. 463, affirmed and held to govern the
case.
2. Neither in that case nor in this was the voluntary submission
of a claim against the government to the special commission
appointed to investigate such claims essential to bar a recovery
against the United States.
3. The bar in both cases rested upon the voluntary acceptance by
the claimants of a smaller sum than their claim as a full
satisfaction of the whole, and acknowledging this in a receipt for
the amount paid, the demand having been disputed for a long time by
the government, and the smaller sum accepted without objection or
protest.
4. Such acceptance being without force or intimidation and with
a full knowledge of all the circumstances, the fact that the sum
was so large that the claimants were induced by their want of the
money to accept the less sum in full is not duress.
Appeal from the Court of Claims on a claim by Child & Co.,
merchants of St. Louis, against the United States for $163,111 as a
balance due on a sale of military stores.
The Court of Claims found a case which in the parts material was
thus:
1st. In the autumn of 1861 and before the 14th of October of
that year, the City of St. Louis being the headquarters of the
Department of the West, Major McKinstry, chief quartermaster of the
department, under the express orders of Major General
Page 79 U. S. 233
Fremont, commanding the department, purchased stores of the
claimants, the fair value of which was $478,119.62, the price
charged by the claimants.
The payment of the quartermaster vouchers held by the claimants
was suspended by the Secretary of War, in common with all others
issued before the 14th October, 1861, by reason of suspected
frauds, extravagance, and irregularities in the Department of the
West.
On the 25th October, 1861, a military commission, consisting of
the Honorable David Davis, of Illinois, the Honorable Joseph Holt,
of Kentucky, and Mr. Hugh Campbell, was appointed by the Secretary
of War, whose powers and duties were defined to be to report upon
all unsettled claims against the military Department of the West
that might have originated prior to the 14th of October, 1861.
After the committee had entered upon its investigations, the
provost-guard of St. Louis forcibly entered the office of the
claimants, and against their consent seized and carried before the
commission their vouchers, business papers, and private books of
account. The commission examined them all, and at the conclusion of
its investigations endorsed upon the vouchers the amounts allowed
by it, and ordered that the sum of $163,111 be deducted from the
vouchers. The commission also withheld all of the vouchers until
the claimants signed a receipt or agreement,
not under seal and
without consideration, which provided that when the reduced
amounts allowed by the commission should be paid, the payment
should be in full of all the claimants' demands against the United
States. The claimants, on their part,
never submitted their
vouchers to the arbitration or decisions of the commission,
and did not sign the receipt voluntarily, but under protest and to
obtain possession of their vouchers withheld until they should do
so.
The claimants after receiving back from the commission their
vouchers presented them for payment to the Quartermaster General,
but the disbursing officer of the United States refused to pay the
same, on the ground that he had no legal authority to do so, and
continued to refuse payment until the enactment by Congress of a
joint resolution approved 11 March, 1863:
"That all sums allowed to be due from the United States to
individuals, by the commission heretofore appointed by the
Secretary of War, . . . shall be deemed to be due and payable,
and
Page 79 U. S. 234
shall be paid by the disbursing officers in each case, upon the
presentation of the voucher, with the commissioners' certificate
thereon, in any form plainly indicating the allowance of the claim
and to what amount."
Thereupon the Quartermaster General "referred the said vouchers
to Major M. S. Miller, quartermaster, for payment, under the above
quoted joint resolution of Congress," and Major Miller, in
pursuance of this order, paid to the claimants, upon these
vouchers, the amounts allowed by the commission.
The claimants, at the time of receiving payment, made no formal
objection or protest, but were required to, and did, sign a receipt
not under seal and without consideration, whereby they
acknowledged having received such reduced amounts "in full of the
above account."
Such were the facts as found by the Court of Claims. The court
did not find anything about Child & Co.'s having accepted the
amount reported as due by the commission, because they would have
become bankrupt had they not done so. But in the
opinion
of the Court of Claims, as given in the official report of the
case, the court, [
Footnote 1]
in speaking of the receipts which Child & Co. had given for the
money, says:
Of these receipts two things may be said: in the first place,
the acts of the commission had taken from the claimants their
business books of account; had suspended their business
transactions;
had reduced them to the verge of bankruptcy,
and had been constantly met by the claimants' repeated and most
earnest protests.
The Court of Claims, as a conclusion of law upon the
facts
found in their finding, decided,
1st. That the purchases were lawful and valid.
2d. That neither Congress nor the claimants having submitted the
controversy to the arbitrament of the commission, the said
commission was not possessed of jurisdiction or power to determine
the rights of the parties, and that the deductions
Page 79 U. S. 235
made by the commission from the claimants' vouchers did not
constitute a valid or binding award. And further that the agreement
or receipt, signed by the claimants on receiving back their
vouchers, was obtained and exacted by duress of their goods, and
was wholly without consideration, and void.
3d. That the joint resolution approved 11 March, 1863, was
simply an authority and direction to the defendants' disbursing
officers to pay the amounts allowed by the commission, and that the
resolution did not ratify the reductions made by the commission
from the claimants' vouchers, nor change, nor affect the legal
rights and liabilities of the parties. That the payment of the
reduced amount made to the claimants under the resolution by the
express order of the quartermaster general, and its acceptance by
the claimants, without objection or protest, did not estop or
conclude the claimants from seeking legal redress for the balance
remaining due upon their accounts; and that the receipts required
by the quartermaster at the time of payment, expressing upon their
face that a less sum was received than that due, and being without
consideration, did not operate as a release of the balance of the
claimants' accounts, and were wholly void.
The Court of Claims accordingly decided that the claimants
should recover the balance claimed, to-wit, $163,111.
From this decision the United States appealed to this Court. The
case being here, it was remanded at the request of the government
to the Court of Claims for certain additional findings, on
questions raised. The supplemental findings found:
1st. That the claims of the claimants were never submitted to
the commission, either before or after the seizure of the books and
papers; but that, before the seizure, the claimants, in pursuance
of the published notice of the commission (requiring all claims
which had accrued before the 14th of October, 1861, to be presented
to it), had in some manner, not shown to the Court of Claims,
presented or given notice of their claims against the defendants to
the said commission. But that the claimants had not presented their
original vouchers, nor any proofs to the commission.
2d. That after the seizure, and while the books and papers
Page 79 U. S. 236
were withheld from the claimants by the commission, the
claimants did appear before the commission with witnesses; but what
the witnesses testified, or whether or not they were produced
before the commission to support the claims, did not appear at the
trial.
The claim, as the reader will have observed, belonged to a class
of demands against the government, originating at St. Louis in the
early days of the civil war, and which by order of the President
were investigated at the time by a special commission appointed for
the purpose. In some respects, therefore, it resembled the cause of
United States v. Adams, twice passed on in this Court;
[
Footnote 2] first on an
appeal, the record of which stated that Adams had presented his
claim to the commission, and the second -- after a decision of that
appeal by this Court, in which decision it was assumed that Adams
had "voluntarily submitted his claims to the adjudication and
decision of the said commissioners" -- on a motion by Adams to
refer the case back to the Court of Claims, because it had
erroneously found as a fact that he had voluntarily presented his
claims, whereas the truth was -- as was shown on the motion -- that
he had not presented them himself at all, but that General Meigs,
head of the bureau of a department of this class of claims, had
presented them, and that they had been heard
ex parte. In
the opinion on the appeal (the first case), [
Footnote 3] this Court -- admitting fully that the
commission had no legal authority to compel a hearing before them,
and that he might have gone to the Court of Claims -- held the fact
to be that Adams had "voluntarily submitted his claims to the
adjudication and decision of the said commission," and adverting to
this and to the fact that after the award by the commission of a
smaller sum than that claimed, Adams took it and gave a receipt --
a document which the government set up as concluding him, while he
contended that he was free to explain it -- the court declared
that:
"In the view we have taken of the case, the giving of the
Page 79 U. S. 237
receipt is of no legal importance. The bar to any further legal
demand against government does not rest upon this acquittance, but
upon the
voluntary submission of the claims to the board;
the hearing and final decisions thereon; the receipt of the
vouchers containing the sum or account found due to the claimant,
and the acceptance of the payment of that amount under the act of
Congress providing therefor. . . . So far as respects the cases of
voluntary submission before the board, we regard the
finding followed by acceptance as conclusive as if it had been
before the first Court of Claims, and heard and decided there, and
the amount found due paid by the government."
In the second case [
Footnote
4] (the motion to remand), the Court said:
"Though it is true that the appellee did not present his claim
to the board, as stated in the finding in the record on appeal, it
cannot, in view of the original record of the evidence before the
Court of Claims, be denied that he made himself a party to the
proceedings and took the benefit of the adjustment of his accounts
by them, which brings the case within the principle decided in 7th
Wallace. "
Page 79 U. S. 240
MR. JUSTICE MILLER delivered the opinion of the Court.
The claim of the appellees for the sum of $478,119.62 was
examined by the special commission appointed by the President. It
allowed the sum of $315,008.15 on the demand, and rejected the
remainder of $163,111.47. The claimants accepted the sum so allowed
by the commission, gave receipts
Page 79 U. S. 241
in full of the accounts included in the demand, and have brought
this suit to recover the amount rejected by the commission.
These facts are undisputed, and part of the findings of the
Court of Claims in the case. If they stood alone, they would bring
it within the principles laid down by this Court in the case of the
United States against Adams. That case was twice argued before us
and affirmed by a full bench, and as we are satisfied with the
principles on which it was decided they must govern us in passing
on subsequent cases, so far as they fall within its rulings.
But the claimants contend that other facts found by the Court of
Claims take this case out of the propositions laid down for the
government of that case, and entitle them to an affirmance of the
judgment rendered in their favor by the Court of Claims. An
important difference between the two is said to exist in the fact
that Adams voluntarily submitted his claim to the commission we
have mentioned, and the claimants in this case did not. And it is
insisted that this submission constituted an important, if not a
controlling element in the decision of the
Adams case.
The court in discussing the question of the conclusiveness of a
receipt which Adams had given in order to obtain possession of his
vouchers, and which he asserted to have been obtained by duress,
says:
"In the view we have taken of the case, the giving of the
receipt is of no legal importance. The bar to any further legal
demand against government does not rest upon this acquittance, but
upon the voluntary submission of the claims to the board; the
hearing and final decision thereon; the receipt of the vouchers
containing the sum or account found due to the claimant, and the
acceptance of the payment of that amount under the act of Congress
providing therefor."
Counsel for the claimants construing the phrase "voluntary
submission," here used, to mean such a submission as would
constitute the commissioners a board of arbitrators, or at all
events, such a submission as would render their decision legally
conclusive, deny that the parties in the present
Page 79 U. S. 242
case ever made such a submission. As much importance seems to
have been given to this question by both parties, an order was
obtained from this Court on motion of the appellants directing the
Court of Claims to make a more specific finding of facts on that
subject. Such a supplementary finding is in the present record, and
that court says, among other things, that the claims of the
claimants were never submitted to said commission. But they further
say in this supplementary finding that the claimants had, in some
manner not shown to the court, presented or given notice of their
claim against the United States to the said commission, but that
they had not presented their
original vouchers, or any
proofs, to the said commission. They also find that the claimants
appeared before said commission with witnesses, but what they
testified to is not shown.
Taking these findings together, it seems to us that the Court of
Claims meant to say that the claimants did not submit their claims
to the commission as arbitrators, or with intent that their
decision should be conclusive, but that they did present their
claims and did appear to support them with witnesses. This view of
their meaning is confirmed by reference to their original finding,
in which it is said that "claimants on their part never submitted
their vouchers to the
arbitration or
decision of
the commission." No doubt these were the facts of the case; and as
to this part of it, they come fairly within the decision of the
court in Adams' case.
In the opinion of the court then delivered, it is held that this
board had no authority to compel parties to submit their claims to
it, and that its decisions were not conclusive when they did submit
them. The court, referring to the various ways open to claimants to
obtain satisfaction of their demands, and after speaking of an
application to Congress, a suit in the Court of Claims, and a
submission to this special commission, adds:
"This tribunal afforded an additional advantage over others --
namely that if, after the hearing and adjustment of the claims, the
claimants were not satisfied, they were free to dissent and look
for redress to the only
Page 79 U. S. 243
legal tribunals provided in such cases."
And to the application of Adams to remand the case to the court
below, founded on the allegation that the Court of Claims had made
a mistake in finding that he had submitted his claim to the board,
this Court responds: [
Footnote
5]
"Though it is true that the appellee did not present his claim
to the board,
as stated in the finding in the record on
appeal, it cannot, in view of the original record of the
evidence before the Court of Claims, be denied that he made himself
a party to the proceedings and took the benefit of the adjustment
of his accounts by them, which brings the case within the principle
decided in 7th Wallace."
But though the claimants might have refused to abide by the
decision of the board and sought relief from the Court of Claims or
from Congress, they did not do so.
We lay out of view in this case, as in the
Adams case,
the receipts which they gave, under protest, in order to regain
possession of their vouchers. But we cannot disregard the finding
of the Court of Claims that, after Congress had appropriated money
to pay the sums found due by the commissioners, the claimants
received the amount so allowed, and signed upon each voucher a
receipt whereby they acknowledged having received said reduced
amount "in full of the above account." And that at the time of
receiving this payment, they made no formal objection or protest,
but were required to and did sign the receipt above described.
Although it is found by the court that these receipts were not
under seal and were without consideration, the latter statement
must have some meaning not apparent to us, in view of the other
fact found also, that over $315,000 was paid to the claimants on
those accounts at the time they gave the receipts.
To avoid the legal effect of these facts it is argued that not
only in giving the receipts above mentioned, but also in accepting
the money for which they were given, the complainants acted under
duress.
Page 79 U. S. 244
We can hardly conceive of a definition of duress that would
bring this case within its terms. Authorities are cited to show
that where, under peculiar circumstances, property is withheld from
the owner and he is forced to pay some unjust demand to obtain
possession of it, he can afterwards maintain a suit for the money
so paid. But no case can be found, we apprehend, where a party who,
without force or intimidation and with a full knowledge of all the
facts of the case, accepts on account of an unliquidated and
controverted demand, a sum less than what he claims and believes to
be due him, and agrees to accept that sum in full satisfaction, has
been permitted to avoid his act on the ground that this is duress.
If the principle contended for here be sound, no party can safely
pay by way of compromise any sum less than what is claimed of him,
for the compromise will be void as obtained by duress. The common
and generally praiseworthy procedure by which businessmen every day
sacrifice part of claims which they believe to be just to secure
payment of the remainder would always be duress, and the compromise
void.
But it is argued that the government should be held to a
different rule than that which applies to private parties. It is
said that the amount in dispute here was so large that the
claimants were compelled to accept what was offered, to avoid
bankruptcy.
No fact found by the Court of Claims, or otherwise presented by
the record, justifies us in supposing that the claimants were
threatened with insolvency, and the circumstance that the claim
which was the subject of the compromise was a very large one can
hardly be accepted in a court of law of equity as a reason for
setting it aside. If indeed there was any such pressing motive in
the minds of the claimants as influenced them strongly to accept
the offer of the government, it cannot, in the absence of fraud or
constraint on its part, invalidate the settlement.
It seems to us that this case, under the ordinary principles of
law applicable to its class, is free from embarrassment.
Page 79 U. S. 245
If there had been no reference to and no finding by the
commission, it would still remain true that here was a claim the
justice of which had been denied, and the amount that was due on it
had been in dispute for nearly two years. The government finally
says to the claimants: "We will pay you a certain sum on this
disputed claim provided you will take it in full satisfaction of
the whole," when, without intimidation, without fraud or
concealment on the part of the government, without protest or
objection on their part, the claimants accept the money offered and
sign a receipt acknowledging it to be in full of the whole claim.
Is not this a legal and binding compromise of the disputed demand?
Is it not a voluntary adjustment of the matter in dispute between
the parties? And we think that it is a strong additional argument
in favor of the validity of this settlement, when it is called in
question in court, that the sum so agreed upon was found to be a
balance justly due on the claim by a commission of three capable
and honest men appointed by the government to ascertain what was
due, and that before this commission the other party presented his
claim and produced his witnesses and was allowed a full and fair
hearing to any extent that he desired.
In this view of the case it is of no avail to urge that the
Court of Claims has found that the whole claim was just and ought
to be paid. After the compromise, that question was no longer open
to inquiry. It is of the very essence of such adjustments of
disputed rights that the contest shall be closed, and whatever
consideration might be given the finding of the Court of Claims on
that subject in another department of the government, this
department, which sits to administer the law, must be governed by
its recognized principles.
Judgment reversed and the case remanded to the Court of
Claims with directions to render judgment in favor of the United
States.
[
Footnote 1]
4 Court of Claims Reports 185.
[
Footnote 2]
<|7 Wall. 463|>7 Wall. 463; <|9 Wall. 554|>9 Wall.
554.
[
Footnote 3]
<|7 Wall. 479|>7 Wall. 479, <|7 Wall. 481|>481.
[
Footnote 4]
<|9 Wall. 554|>9 Wall. 554.
[
Footnote 5]
<|9 Wall. 554|>9 Wall. 554.
MR. JUSTICE CLIFFORD, with whom concurred the CHIEF JUSTICE,
dissenting:
The Court of Claims having found that the claim in this case was
never submitted to the commission appointed by the direction of the
President to examine such claims, I am unable to concur in the
conclusion of the Court that the case is controlled by the decision
of the Court in the case of
United States v. Adams, in 7th
Wallace, and for the reason that the claim was never so
presented.
DAVIS and FIELD, JJ., absent.
