Campbell v. Chase National Bank of New York (1933)

[shikamaru]

Campbell v. Chase National Bank of New York (1933)

Interesting case. The complainant made several errors in filing his initial case in a federal court.

The plaintiff sued in Federal Court to retrieve his gold from Chase in 1933.

Some interesting dicta from the case:

[shikamaru]

More ...

This court can take judicial notice of the fact that the banks of the country were then closed, and that it was of vital importance that, as soon as possible, each bank which was in a proper condition to function should be reopened; that it was obvious that gold coin and gold bullion could not be allowed to be taken away from the banks, but that every dictate of wisdom pointed to the necessity of having all gold in the banks remain there, and that all gold, whether coin or bullion, already in the hands of private persons, should be brought back, whenever the authorities might deem necessary, into the hands of some fiscal agency of the government.

Gold has for ages been the symbol of wealth, and in modern times has been recognized throughout almost the whole world as the basis — sometimes alone and sometimes in connection with silver — of all currency and credit. Under the provisions of the Constitution above quoted, Congress, which is given plenary power to coin money and regulate the value thereof, and to borrow on the credit of the United States, must, as an incident of those powers, also have power to legislate regarding gold bullion held by persons within the United States and to treat gold bullion as affected with public interest.

There has not been cited to me any case which involves the precise question here presented, but the Supreme Court has held that the private ownership of silver coin is subject to the will of the sovereign and can be controlled by the sovereign.

Mr. Justice Lurton, writing the opinion of the court, said, 218 U. S. at page 310, 31 S.Ct. 21, 23, 54 L. Ed. 1049, 30 L. R. A. (N. S.) 1176: "Conceding the title of the owner of such coins, yet there is attached to such ownership those limitations which public policy may require by reason of their quality as a legal tender and as a medium of exchange. These limitations are due to the fact that public law gives to such coinage a value which does not attach as a mere consequence of intrinsic value. Their quality as a legal tender is an attribute of law aside from their bullion value. They bear, therefore, the impress of sovereign power which fixes value and authorizes their use in exchange."

VII. By section 3 of title 1 of the Act of March 9, 1933, Congress has authorized the Secretary of the Treasury, whenever in his judgment such action is necessary to protect the currency system of the United States, to requisition all gold coin, gold bullion, and gold certificates owned by persons under the jurisdiction of the United States.

By this section the Secretary of the Treasury is the official authorized to exercise the power of eminent domain in respect of gold, and it is necessary to consider whether Congress had the power to exercise the right of eminent domain on gold as therein prescribed.

Isn't that special?

[shikamaru]

How about those apples?

[shikamaru]

Within any zone of government action in which plenary power has been granted by the Constitution to the federal government, the federal government has all the inherent powers of sovereignty. Among the powers inherent in every sovereign is the power of eminent domain.
[ 5 F.Supp. 171 ]

Under the Constitution the power of eminent domain means the right to take property for public use on payment, under the provisions of the Fifth Amendment, of just compensation for its value determined as of the time and the place of its taking.

The right of eminent domain is described in Kohl v. United States, 91 U.S. 367, 371, 23 L. Ed. 449, as an "offspring of political necessity"; and as "inseparable from sovereignty, unless denied to it by its fundamental law." In that case the court aptly observed that the provision of the Fifth Amendment, to the effect that private property should not be taken for public use without just compensation, was in itself an implied recognition of the existence of the power of eminent domain in the federal government in the zones of governmental action delegated to it by the Constitution.

In United States v. Jones, 109 U.S. 513, Mr. Justice Field said at pages 518-519, 3 S.Ct. 346, 350, 27 L. Ed. 1015: "The power to take private property for public uses, generally termed the right of eminent domain, belongs to every independent government. It is an incident of sovereignty, and, as said in Mississippi R. River Boom Co. v. Patterson, 98 U.S. 403, 406 [25 L. Ed. 206], requires no constitutional recognition. The provision found in the fifth amendment to the federal constitution, and in the constitutions of the several states, for just compensation for the property taken, is merely a limitation upon the use of the power. It is no part of the power itself, but a condition upon which the power may be exercised. It is undoubtedly true that the power of appropriating private property to public uses vested in the general government — its right of eminent domain, which Vattel defines to be the right of disposing, in case of necessity and for the public safety, of all the wealth of the country — cannot be transferred to a state any more than its other sovereign attributes; and that, when the use to which the property taken is applied is public, the propriety or expediency of the appropriation cannot be called in question by any other authority."

The power of eminent domain extends to all kinds of property without exception, whether real or personal, tangible or intangible. The court said in United States v. Lynah, 188 U.S. 445, at page 465, 23 S.Ct. 349, 355, 47 L. Ed. 539:
"All private property is held subject to the necessities of government. The right of eminent domain underlies all such rights of property. The government may take personal or real property whenever its necessities, or the exigencies of the occasion, demand. So, the contention that the government had a paramount right to appropriate this property may be conceded, but the Constitution in the 5th Amendment guarantees that when this governmental right of appropriation — this asserted paramount right — is exercised it shall be attended by compensation.

"The government may take real estate for a postoffice, a courthouse, a fortification, or a highway; or in time of war it may take merchant vessels and make them part of its naval force. But can this be done without an obligation to pay for the value of that which is so taken and appropriated? Whenever in the exercise of its governmental rights it takes property the ownership of which it concedes to be in an individual, it impliedly promises to pay therefor. Such is the import of the cases cited as well as of many others."

On the condition of payment of just compensation, property of many kinds have been requisitioned by the federal government under the power of eminent domain, and various methods have been used in its exercise of that power. The questions in which such requisitions have been concerned have usually come up only in cases involving the amount of compensation to be paid; for the right to requisition has, as far as I know, been unchallenged at least in the sense that it is challenged here. Instances of property taken by the federal government are: Coal, by the Navy, United States v. New River Collieries Company, 262 U.S. 341, 43 S.Ct. 565, 67 L. Ed. 1014; a bridge and the franchise therefor, by the War Department to improve a waterway, Monongahela Navigation Company v. United States, 148 U.S. 312, 13 S.Ct. 622, 37 L. Ed. 463; a site for a nitrate plant, by the War Department, Campbell v. United States, 266 U.S. 368, 370, 45 S.Ct. 115, 69 L. Ed. 328; land for lighthouses, by the Treasury Department, Chappell v. United States, 160 U.S. 499, 16 S.Ct. 397, 40 L. Ed. 510; contracts for the construction of ships by the President under the Emergency Shipping Act of June 15, 1917 (see 40 Stat. 182), Brooks Scanlon Corporation v. United States, 265 U.S. 106, 44 S.Ct. 471, 68 L. Ed. 934; Russian Volunteer Fleet v. United States, 282 U.S. 481, 51 S.Ct. 229, 75 L. Ed. 473, and Dutch merchant vessels in our ports seized by the President in 1917 during the World War. There has not been, so far as I am aware, any litigation in our courts over such seizure because this extreme exercise of the sovereign's right of eminent domain is recognized under
[ 5 F.Supp. 172 ]
international law in time of war and is therein called the right of angary. Pitt Cobbett's Cases on International Law (4th Ed.) vol. II, pp. 384-387.

Eminent domain

[shikamaru]

Angary

The legal right of a belligerent to seize, use, or destroy the property of a neutral, provided that full compensation is made.

The hits ... keep on coming.

[shikamaru]

VIII. As I am satisfied that Congress had the right to enact title I of the Act of March 9, 1933, under its power over the currency, I now turn to a consideration of the question whether title 1 of the Act of March 9, 1933, could be held unconstitutional, not for lack of power in Congress to pass it, but owing to the form thereof, by which Congress delegates its regulatory and requisitioning powers over gold to the President and to the Secretary of the Treasury, respectively, by sections 2 and 3.

Interesting, of course ....

[Treefarmer]

Shikamaru, you are indeed awesome!
Keep it coming, thank you.

[shikamaru]

Shikamaru, you are indeed awesome!
Keep it coming, thank you.

The patriot community has been focusing on the wrong thing.

Instead of HJR-192, they should be focusing on all the acts, executive orders, and the power of eminent domain with regard to the confiscation of gold held by private citizens in 1933.

[cernicolo]

is it possible, in the context of this thread, for a party to grant a right, privelege, or authority it does not already possess to another party; or for such a party to remove from itself such a right, privelege or authority?

another way, does congress have the express authority to abdicate any of its enumerated priveleges? if the right originates with the creator and is then granted to men, is it possible for the right/privelege granted be removed by an entity of man's creation?

it appears to me the passage of the congressional act contradicts axioms of law not to mention sound logic.

[shikamaru]

is it possible, in the context of this thread, for a party to grant a right, privelege, or authority it does not already possess to another party; or for such a party to remove from itself such a right, privelege or authority?

another way, does congress have the express authority to abdicate any of its enumerated priveleges? if the right originates with the creator and is then granted to men, is it possible for the right/privelege granted be removed by an entity of man's creation?

The originating body, in your example, would be the several States in their aggregate capacity i.e. the United States of America.
The created would be the government of the United States.
If the States were not happy with how its agent was using its powers, the States could alter the charter (U.S. Constitution) in which to limit the agent's exercise of power.

In the case presented, government of the United States is claiming to use sovereign powers antecedent to and long standing before the Constitution of the United States.

[David Merrill]

Thank you for breaking that out. That saves a lot of time understanding diversity of citizenship from the federal and federal reserve districts.