RELIEF OF GEORGE MATTINGLY. Consideration of a bill for the relief of George Mattingly, presented to the President for his approval. Opinion of Aug. 3, 1854, 6 Op. 636. REMISSION OF FINES, PENAL TIES, AND FORFEITURES. See FINES, PENALTIES, AND FORFEITURES. REMOVAL. See ARMY, IX; OFFICE, IX. REMOVAL OF CAUSES. See COURTS, II. REPRISAL. See also INTERNATIONAL LAW, I. 1. The laws of nations do not allow of reprisals, except in case of violent injuries directed and supported by the State, or justice absolutely denied, in re minime dubia, by all the tribunals, and afterwards by the prince. Opinion of April 12, 1793, 1 Op. 30. 2. Where the judges are left free, and give sentence according to their conscience, though it should be erroneous, that would be no ground for reprisals. Upon doubtful questions different men think and judge differently; and all a friend can desire is, that justice should be as impartially administered to him as it is to the subjects of the prince in whose courts the matter is tried. Ibid. of the Interior. Opinion of Dec. 14, 1853, 6 Op. 228. 2. Where a claim or account against the Government, arising in the military service, has been adjusted by the accounting officers of the Treasury, and the balance found due thereon certified by the Comptroller to the War Department for payment, the Secretary of War cannot lawfully withhold his requisition simply on the ground that the balance so certified is in excess of what the officers of his Department deem to be allowable. Opinion of March 25, 1869, 13 Op. 6. 3. Where the Comptroller's certificate is unaccompanied by the Auditor's action, or does not affirmatively (by recital or otherwise) show that the account has been acted upon by the latter, the head of Department to whom the balance is certified should withhold his requisition for payment until satisfactory evidence on that point is produced. Opinion of Aug. 2, 1876, 15 Op. 140. 4. The action of the Auditor need not be incorporated in the certificate of the Comptroller, nor form part of the same document. Ibid. 5. It is the duty of a head of a Department, after facts have been submitted under section 191 Rev. Stat. which, in his judgment, affect the correctness of a balance certified to him upon settlement of a claim by the proper accounting officers of the Treasury, and after the certificate has been returned by the Comptroller with the decision in the case reaffirmed, to issue his requisition for payment of the balance certified. Opinion of Aug. 19, 1876, 15 Op. 596. 6. Signing the requisition in such case under protest is without effect. Ibid. RESERVATIONS. See also INDIANS, III; PUBLIC LANDS, XXI. I. Indian. II. Military. I. Indian. REQUISITION FOR PAYMENT. See also ACCOUNTING OFFICERS, III. 1. The reservations to certain Indians, con1. The requisitions of the Superintendent of tained in the treaty of 20th October, 1832, with Public Printing are to be made by him di- the Pottawatomies, excepted out certain lands rectly on the Secretary of the Treasury, and from the general cession, which did not, theredo not require to be approved by the Secretary | fore, pass; consequently the title thereto re mains as it was before the treaty. Opinion of the partner assigning exhibits authority to asSept. 30, 1833, 2 Op. 588. sign from all. Opinion of March 16, 1839, 3 Op. 423. 2. Being held under the original title, the occupants cannot convey them to individuals, but can only make a valid cession thereof to the United States. Ibid. 3. Where a reservee, entitled under the Choctaw treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek (1830) to two sections of land-the one to include his improvement and the other to be a float-had built and paid for a house on section 31, in township 16, range 1 east, and had no other improvements in the nation, but resided with his mother on another lot: Held, that his residence with his mother does not deprive him of the right to the said section. Opinion of March 19, 1834, 2 Op. 617. 4. Under that treaty, where two reservees shall be found to have improvements on the same lot, the same may be divided, and the deficiency made up from contiguous land not otherwise appropriated. Ibid. 5. The President may properly give his consent and approval to the conveyance by will made by Indians La Gros and Waises-kea, his daughter, to General Tipton, to four sections of land, reserved to said La Gros in the treaty with the chiefs and warriors of the Miamies, concluded 23d October, 1826, subject to all legal questions in respect to the capacity and right to make conveyances by will, and to the execution, validity, and effect of those instruments. Opinion of March 29, 1834, 2 Op. 631. 6. Whether Indian reservees are capable in law of devising their reservations to third persons in any case, quære. Ibid. 7. The twenty-nine sections reserved to Creeks under the treaty of 24th March, 1832, may be lawfully located either before or after assignment thereof by the tribe; with this qualification in respect to locations made before such assignment, that should any of those sections be located to persons who possess improvements not already allotted to them under other provisions in the treaty, such persons shall be entitled to insist that the tracts assigned to them shall be located in such manner as to include their improvements. Opinion of Dec. 26, 1834, 2 Op. 696. 8. Transfers of Creek reservations by assignees whose assignments express them as a firm, are not valid when executed by one member thereof, but only when executed by all, unless 9. But where the reservee assigned to a firm, as to M., W., P. & Co., and the transfer by the firm was assigned in that manner, the assignment is valid, and the patent may issue to the assignee. Ibid. 10. Where there are two assignors, and the names of both to the assignment are in the same handwriting, the assignment is invalid as to him who did not sign, unless the other exhibits authority from him to sign. Ibid. 11. The approval of the President to a sale of a Choctaw reservation is required only to contracts between the Indian reservees and their vendees. Opinion of May 25, 1842, 4 Op. 37. 12. The patents ought to issue to the first vendees in trust for the equitable proprietors, or subsequent assignees, and bear on their face a declaration of trust. Ibid. 13. The President should confirm those sales of Creek reservations only where the law of the State of Alabama has been complied withsuch having been the practice. Opinion of July 23, 1842, 4 Op. 75. 14. The former opinion (of July 23, 1842, 4 Op. 75), on new facts stated, and assurances that the practice has not conformed to the opinions of Attorneys-General Butler and Gilpin, reconsidered; and held that, in all cases where the provisions of the treaty of March 24, 1832, have been fulfilled, the sales shown to have been fair, and the consideration adequate, the sales may be confirmed, even though, under the law of Alabama, they may have been informal and irregular. Opinion of July 28, 1842, 4 Op. 77. 15. Congress did constitutionally confer original authority upon administrators to make sales, without reference to the law of Alabama. Ibid. 16. The names of assignors need not be written in full in assignments of Creek Indian contracts; and the fact that they do not import a consideration does not render them insufficient. Opinion of Aug. 17, 1842, 4 Op. 85. 17. The patents heretofore issued to the parents of Choctaw children, for such children, must stand for what they shall be found by the judiciary to be worth; but patents for reservations to Indian children, under the four teenth article of the Choctaw treaty of 1830, hereafter to be issued, should be made to the children and not to their parents; care being taken that they show on their face that they are issued to the children independently of their father, in fulfillment of the fourteenth article of that treaty. Opinion of Nov. 2, 1842, 4 Op. 107. 18. The treaty of 1817 with the Cherokees gave to the heads of Cherokee families an election to go or stay and become citizens; and until their election to stay the reservations do not vest in them or their children. Opinion of Nov. 21, 1842, 4 Op. 116. 19. The President has power to cause the lands reserved for orphans under the Choctaw treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek of 1830, to be sold, and to cause patents to be issued to purchasers. He may, on application of the orphans for whom the provision was made, cause the proceeds of land located for them to be applied to some purpose beneficial to them; wherefore the sales already made of these lands are valid. Opinion of May 27, 1844, 4 Op. 326. 20. The commissioners to carry into effect the treaty with the Choctaws of 1830, called the treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek, did not have authority to take proof of any claim in favor of an assignee of an Indian who transferred his claim within the five years mentioned in the ninth section of the act of August 23, 1842, chap. 187, inasmuch as they were expressly denied any authority to recognize or allow to an Indian, or to the assignee of an Indian, any claim which had been so assigned, in whole or in part. Opinion of May 20, 1845, 4 Op. 381. 21. The five per cent. Alabama stocks transferred from the Chickasaw to the Choctaw fund in compliance with the treaty of 24th March, 1837, between those nations did not fully come up to what the Choctaws might have reasonably required. Opinion of Aug. | 1, 1845, 4 Op. 419. 22. But as the consent of the Senate was and is requisite to any transfer or investment for them, it will be requisite to the making up of the deficiency. Ibid. 23. The Cherokees remaining in the States of North Carolina and Tennessee are not entitled to the commutation for removal and subsistence given by the eighth article of the Cherokee treaty of December, 1835, to those who have removed west of the Mississippi. Opinion of Sept. 19, 1845, 4 Op. 435. 24. They can only receive their due portion of personal benefits accruing under the treaty for their claims, improvements, and per capita, whenever an appropriation shall have been made to carry it into effect. Ibid. 25. As the official acts of President Van Buren and his successor in office, in relation to the confirmation of sales of reservations under the Choctaw treaty of Dancing Rabbit Creek of 1830, were predicated on a construction of that instrument which forbids certain sales, and as certain questions arise which ought to be adjudicated, it is recommended that a case to test the validity of sales made by the commissioner be brought before the Supreme Court. Opinion of May 2, 1846, 4 Op. 495. 26. The President's consent to sales of land reserved to the Indians by the Pottawatomie treaty of 17th October, 1826, and the Miami treaty, concluded on the 23d of the same month, is only necessary in cases where the sales shall have been made by the reservees. Opinion of Aug. 28, 1846, 4 Op. 530. 27. Where the reservees shall have died, and sales are made under an order of court granted pursuant to the laws of the State in which the lands are situated, the President's consent is not necessary to their validity. Ibid. 28. Those treaties not only extinguished the Indian right of occupancy, but granted the reserved lands as effectually to all interests and purposes as if patents had been issued to the so called reservees; and as the State laws are operative upon lands thus held in fee-simple, and have applied to those in question by causing their transfer for the payment of the debts of their decedent owner, the title of the purchaser is perfect without the President's consent. Ibid. 29. But as the rights of the heirs cannot be affected injuriously by the giving of the Executive consent, and as the sale in this case appears to have been fairly made and for a satisfactory price, and as it may possibly relieve the title from doubt, and thereby prevent litigation, it may nevertheless be given. Ibid. 30. The certificate of an award to a claimant under the treaty of 1835-'6 with the Cherokees cannot be so amended as to include a claim, which was presented and allowed under the thirteenth article of that treaty, within the third article of the "supplementary articles" thereto. Opinion of June 17, 1847, 4 Op. 598. 31. All Cherokee reservees who were obliged to abandon their reservations by the laws of the State in which they were situated, were expressly provided for in the thirteenth article of the treaty, and expressly excluded from the third article of the supplement. Ibid. 32. Neither the wife of a white man, who entered a reservation to her under the Cherokee treaty of 1817, and within the limits of the grant of North Carolina to the Cherokees in 1783, and the treaty of 1819 with the Cherokee agent, in her right, nor her children, are entitled to compensation for the value of such reservation, if it appear that the same were voluntarily sold and abandoned prior to the ratification of the treaty of 1835-'36. Opinion of July 22, 1847, 4 Op. 615. 33. The reservation in this case having been sold and abandoned long before the ratification of the said treaty, the claim made for its value ought to be rejected. Ibid. 34. The lands reserved to certain half-breeds of the Kansas Nation of Indians, named in the sixth article of the treaty of June 3, 1825, and afterwards surveyed and allotted to them respectively in accordance with the provisions of the treaty, are lands the claims to which were "confirmed by law" before the passage of the act of December 22, 1854, chap. 10, and, as such, may be patented under that act to the reservees. Opinion of July 20, 1863, 10 Op. 508. 35. The act of May 26, 1863, chap. 61, which explicitly confirms the title of the persons named in the sixth article of the treaty of June 3, 1825, with the Kansas Indians, was entirely superfluous as an act of confirmation; for the title reserved and guaranteed to the half-breeds by the treaty was a perfect title, and did not need the aid of any subsequent act of Congress to impart to it validity or strength. Ibid. 36. The words "confirmed by law" mean confirmation by the act of that power which, under our system, enacts law, and not confirmation by mere construction of law; and the act of December 22, 1854, chap. 10, authorizes the issue of a patent in every case where, by valid enactment, the law-making power had before its date declared the title to be in the person named. Ibid. tion by law, within the meaning of the act of 1854; inasmuch as a treaty is to be regarded as an act of the legislature, whenever it operates without the aid of a legislative provision. Ibid. 38. The stipulations in the sixth article of the treaty of June 3, 1825, with the Kansas Indians, in favor of the half-breeds, were not mere voluntary grants of lands, but guarantees of the existing right and title of the persons named to the land set apart to them. Ibid. 39. The President has power, under the second section of the act of June 12, 1858, chap. 155, on the requisition of the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, with the approval of the Secretary of the Interior, to direct the military force to co-operate with the proper Indian agent in effecting the removal of intruders from the tribal reservations in Kansas. Opinion of Sept. 20, 1866, 12 Op. 51. 40. In the absence of authority conferred either by treaty or by statutory provision, it is not competent to the Secretary of the Interior to set apart a portion of the public domain in Washington Territory for the purpose of an Indian reservation. Opinion of Feb. 8, 1873, 14 Op. 181. 41. Under the provisions of section 2149 of the Revised Statutes, the Commissioner of Indian Affairs, with the approval of the Secretary of the Interior, and also the superintendent of Indian affairs, Indian agents, and sub-agents, may remove from said reservation all persons found thereon contrary to law; and the President is authorized to direct the military force to be employed in effecting their removal. Opinion of Sept. 1, 1874, 14 Op. 452. 42. An order directing the military to be thus employed need not be issued by the President by his own hand; it would be sufficient if issued by the Secretary of War. Ibid. 43. The title of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions to the missionary station within the limits of the Nez Percé Indian reservation, derived under the acts of August 14, 1848, chap. 177, and March 2, 1853, chap. 90 (assuming that a title passed to said board by virtue of those acts), was then, and has ever since continued to be, subject to the Indian right of occupancy in the Nez Percé tribe of Indians; and until this Indian right is extinguished, the present holder of that title 37. A confirmation by treaty is a confirma- has no right, merely by virtue of such title, to enter upon and take possession of the premises. Opinion of May 3, 1875, 14 Op. 569. 44. L., who claimed title to the tract of land included by said station, as assignee of said board, recovered judgment by default in the Territorial court in an action to recover possession of the premises brought against an Indian agent occupying the same, and obtained actual possession thereof under a writ issued upon said judgment: Held, that the judgment determined nothing adverse to the Indian right; | that the writ founded on such judgment was ineffectual to give L. legal possession of land to which the Indian right still adheres; and that in entering upon the reservation thereunder he was simply an intruder, and may be summarily removed therefrom in the mode provided by section 2118 of the Revised Statutes. Ibid. 45. On April 27, 1869, the lands within the limits of Camp Wright, in California, were set apart as a military reservation by order of the President. That order was revoked by a subsequent order of the President, dated July 26, 1876, which reserved said lands for the use and occupancy of the Indians of the Round Valley Indian reservation. The limits of the latter reservation were defined by and under the act of March 3, 1873, chap. 333, and the lands of Camp Wright lie outside of those limits. Held, that the limits of the Indian reservation cannot be enlarged by the President by annexing said lands thereto; but that the President may permit said lands to be used in connection with such reservation, so long as no action is taken by Congress for their disposal. Opinion of Aug. 10, 1878, 16 Op. 121. 46. Ey the act of June 14, 1880, chap. 211, an appropriation is made for the construction of a dam at Lake Winnibigoshish, with a proviso "that all injuries occasioned to individuals by overflow of their lands shall be ascertained and determined by agreement or in accordance with the laws of Minnesota, and shall not exceed in the aggregate $5,000." The land to be overflowed, as is ascertained by actual survey, lies within the limits of the reservation of the Chippewa Indians, secured to that tribe by the treaty of February 22, 1855. Held, that the said proviso, being in terms limited to the lands of individuals, cannot be extended to lands of the Chippewa tribe, and | that Congress has not otherwise, in said act, manifested an intention to exercise the right of eminent domain in or upon lands in said Indian reservation, or to authorize the overflow of any part of that reservation, or the taking of timber or materials therefrom. Opinion of Aug. 13, 1880, 16 Op. 553. II. Military. 47. Decision as to the quantity of land to be reserved for public use, and the places where to be located, rests in the discretion of the President, subject to such regulations as may from time to time be provided by law, either as to the particular public use, the quantity. or the subsequent disposal thereof for private use. Opinion of Oct. 15, 1853, 6 Op. 157. 48. At present the statute limitation as to quantity in the Territory of Oregon is not exceeding six hundred and forty acres for forts and twenty acres for any other public use. Subject to this condition, the military reservation of Fort Vancouver in that Territory is valid, notwithstanding any pre-existing donation claim of an inhabitant of the Territory, and notwithstanding the provisional government of Oregon had located the county seat of justice at Fort Vancouver. Ibid. 49. The Chicago and Rock Island Railroad Company and Railroad Bridge Company cannot lawfully enter upon and use, for the purpose of a road, or for any other object, the military reservation of Rock Island, under pretense of authority from the State of Illinois. Opinion of Aug. 21, 1854, 6 Op. 670. 50. An act of Congress giving to railroad companies a right of way through the public lands does not apply to or include the military reservation of Rock Island. Ibid. 51. Under the act of March 3, 1819, chap. 88, authorizing the Secretary of War to cause to be sold such military sites as may become useless for military purposes, the Secretary has power to annul and set aside a sale made by commissioners appointed to carry the act into execution at any time before final confirmation by him, for any just cause. Opinion of March 17, 1859, 9 Op. 298. 52. The Leavenworth Coal Company, on payment of the purchase money of the land embraced by their lease, will be entitled to a patent therefor in fee, and with it a grant also of the exclusive right of mining the coal un |