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JUDGE OF ADMIRALTY.

truly great magistrate. Such an one may make for himself and leave to the nations a name and praise among

men.

While his office may occasionally call for the most exacting investigation of great and grave questions of international and general maritime law, it also brings him in almost daily contact with a class of persons, who, as suitors, need sympathy and protection, and often deserve favor.

As a judge, then, he should be tender and not timid; fond of the principles of admiralty law, and not unfamiliar with the details and practice of this interesting branch of jurisprudence; devoted to his daily duties, and quietly but firmly discharging them, so long as health may permit him or his own personal tastes be content to retain office.

But above all, let him thoroughly eradicate all political aspirations: indulge in no delusive visions of other public distinctions; leaving only for himself that chastened ambition, which is swayed and satisfied by naught else save a desire to do right and perform his duty well and wisely, while acting as judge.

Such a judge may not want the occasion, and will find ample time, to enable him to devote his mind and all its energies, duly to discharge the appropriate functions of his position; and if so, he may rightfully be classed with Stowell and Lushington in England, and Sprague in this country; all of whom have been eminently successful in their judicial career; the latter also conspicuous as a model of official courtesy and courage.

On some occasions, the admiralty has been unjustly arraigned as inconsistent with free institutions. The noble vindication of it by Chief Justice Taney should

VINDICATION OF THE ADMIRALTY.

53

disabuse the public mind of all future prejudice. In Taylor v. Caryl, 20 How. 615, he says: "I can therefore see no ground of jealousy or enmity to the admiralty jurisdiction. It has in it no one quality inconsistent with or unfavorable to free institutions. The simplicity and celerity of its proceedings make a jurisdiction of that kind a necessity in every just and enlightened

commercial nation.

"The delays unavoidably incident to a court of common law, from its rules and modes of proceeding, are equivalent to a denial of justice, where the rights of seamen, or maritime contracts or torts are concerned, and sea-faring men the witnesses to prove them; and the public confidence is conclusively proved by the well-known fact, that in the great majority of cases where there is a choice of jurisdictions, the party seeks his remedy in the Court of Admiralty in preference to a court of common law of the State, however eminent and distinguished the State tribunals may be."

All the cases cited upon jurisdiction may be profitably reëxamined and studied by the reader. De Lovio v. Boit in 1815; The Thomas Jefferson in 1825; The Orleans v. Phoebus, 1835; The Coomb's case, 1838; The New Jersey Steamboat Navigation Co. v. Merchants Bank; Clarke et al. v. Waring et al., 1848; The Genesee Chief and Ontario, 1851; Fretz et al. v. Bull et al., 1851; Walsh v. Rogers, 13 How. 283; The Magnolio, 1857; Taylor v. Caryl, 20 How. 615; Grant v. Poullon, ibid. 162; Hemmenway v. Fisher, ibid. 255; People's Ferry Co. v. Beers, ibid. 393; Snow et al. v. Hill et al., ibid. 543.

Admiralty jurisdiction in the United States, then, extends to cases involving the claims of material-men ;

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GENERAL JURISDICTION.

mariners' wages; contracts of affreightment; bottomry and respondentia bonds; possessory and petitory suits between part-owners; salvage, collision, necessary supplies and repairs in foreign ports; survey and sale of damaged or disabled ships; pilotage, wharfage, consortship, spoliation and damage, assaults, imprisonment and other torts at sea; ransom, convoy; demurrage; all questions of prize and its incidents, including claims for damages and costs in cases of wrongful capture; seizures; also to all criminal cases for which there is any express legislative enactments since 1789; such as seizures for violation of the customs, post-office or revenue laws, and all such other offenses as may be deemed and declared to be criminal by congressional

enactments.

HAVING stated all that seemed to be necessary and useful upon jurisdiction generally, the subject of collision in American waters shall next claim attention, as being one which has already required the consideration of the American courts to a considerable extent, and is likely, in future, to demand still more of the time and attention of courts.

A large class of marine torts, denominated cases of collision, are properly embraced within the admiralty jurisdiction of the United States.

Certain technical rules, which apply to like cases in England (and possibly originating from its insular position), are in the United States measurably abrogated, superseded, or at least greatly extended; such are especially those relating to the ebb and flow of tide and to the fresh or salt qualities of tide-waters, and “infra primos pontes" of its principal rivers.

A series of decisions of the Supreme Court are reported, most of which, with perhaps one exception, may be deemed and considered as the prevailing and established law of the land. The General Smith, Magnolio, Genesee Chief, Monticello, New York, and Oregon, decided by the Supreme Court at Washington, were much considered, and are decisions of weight and authority.

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COLLISION, JURISDICTION,

The Thomas Jefferson has for many years ceased to be authority, having been overruled.

And by these cases and others, the doctrines established as rules of proceeding and decision in admiralty, in cases of collision, are, that process in rem is sustainable in the United States district courts for collisions occurring on the Mississippi, Missouri, Alabama, and other great inland rivers and waters, whether above or below the ebb and flow of tide, or within the bodies of counties even (infra corpus comitatus); and, since the passage of the act of February 26, 1845, also in cases of tort occurring on our great lakes and other inland waters, as well as on waters "navigable from the sea."

Early, indeed, in our political history and life as a people under the Constitution, waters "navigable from the sea" were embraced within the admiralty jurisdiction of the United States, particularly in cases of seizure.

In § 9, of the Judiciary Act of 1789, it is expressly provided, that "the district courts shall have, exclusively of the courts of the several States, cognizance of all crimes and offenses that shall be cognizable under the authority of the United States, committed within their respective districts or upon the high seas; and shall have exclusive original cognizance of all civil causes of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, including all seizures under laws of import, navigation, or trade of the United States, where the seizures are made, on waters which are navigable from the sea by vessels of ten or more tons burden, within their respective districts as well as upon the high seas; saving to suitors, in all cases, the right of a common-law remedy, when the common law is competent to give it."