tropical fruit, and the United States Government repaid to the Bahama traders some 50,000 dollars in consequence of this mistake."

In a note as to this statement in relation the act of 1872, it is said by Hardcastle: "The authority for this statement is the Blue Book of the Bahamas for the year 1873, transmitted to the Colonial Office by Governor Pope Hennessy, May 27, 1874, and published in a parliamentary blue book entitled 'Papers Relating to H. M.'s Colonial Possessions, Part I, 1875.'"

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The case on which the Secretary of the Treasury made the decision was Manuscript Case No. 1466, Book of Miscellaneous Customs Cases, for which see also Synopsis of Treasury Department Decisions, 1873, No. 1730; Solicitor's Opinion, December 2, 1873. The Attorney-General held in Thompson's case March 24, 1857, that "the acts of Congress enrolled in the Department of State are conclusive evidence of the written law." 9 Opinions, 1. He also held that "neither the journals of Congress, nor any other species of extrinsic evidence can avail to strike anything out of the acts passed, or interpolate anything into them." 9 Opinions, 1. 9 Opinions, 270. But see Blake v. National Bank, 23 Wallace, 307.

It may not be certain that the "Fruit-plant" case adopts a rule different from that which prevails in England. It may have been decided not on the question of punctuation, but, perhaps, on the rule that in cases of serious ambiguity or doubtful construction in revenue acts, that doubts are to be resolved in favor of the importer. Sedgwick Stat., 288 n. Powers v. Barney, 5 Blatchford, C. C. R., 202. The case might well have been decided on this principle, for it is well settled that "common sense should prevail over strict grammatical rules, and punctuation should not control." Sedgwick Stat., 225 п.

IN THE MATTER OF THE APPOINTMENT BY THE PRESIDENT OF AN OF-
FICER "TO PERFORM THE DUTIES OF THE OFFICE OF THE FIRST
COMPTROLLER IN" THE TREASURY DEPARTMENT "DURING THE AB-
SENCE
OF THE SAID FIRST COMPTROLLER AND THE DEPUTY
FIRST COMPTROLLER IN THE SAID DEPARTMENT."-COMPTROLLER'S
CASE.

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1. In case of the "absence, or sickness," of both the First Comptroller and the Deputy First Comptroller of the Treasury Department, the President has power to "authorize and direct any other officer" in the Department, "whose appointment is vested in the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to perform the duties" of First Comptroller, until "such absence or sickness shall cease."

2. It is competent for the President to make a general order applicable to such cases of absence or sickness.

3. The President's order of October 23, 1882, authorizing and directing the Second Comptroller to act in such cases, is valid.

The Revised Statutes contain the following sections:

"SEC. 177. In case of the death, resignation, absence, or sickness of the head of any Department, the first or sole assistant thereof shall, unless otherwise directed by the President, as provided by section one hundred and seventy-nine, perform the duties of such head until a successor is appointed, or such absence or sickness shall cease.

"SEC. 178. In case of the death, resignation, absence, or sickness of the chief of any Bureau, or of any officer thereof, whose appointment is not vested in the head of the Department, the assistant or deputy of such chief or of such officer, or if there be none, then the chief clerk of such Bureau, shall, unless otherwise directed by the President, as provided by section one hundred and seventy-nine, perform the duties of such chief or of such officer until a successor is appointed or such absence or sickness shall cease.

"SEC. 179. In any of the cases mentioned in the two preceding sections, except the death, resignation, absence, or sickness of the Attorney-General, the President may, in his discretion, authorize and direct the head of any other Department or any other officer in either Department whose appointment is vested in the President, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to perform the duties of the vacant office until a successor is appointed, or the sickness or absence of the incumbent shall cease.

"SEC. 180. A vacancy occasioned by death or resignation must not be temporarily filled under the three preceding sections for a longer period than ten days.

"SEC. 181. No temporary appointment, designation, or assignment of one officer to perform the duties of another, in the cases covered by sections one hundred and seventy-seven and one hundred and seventyeight, shall be made otherwise than as provided by those sections, except to fill a vacancy happening during a recess of the Senate.

"SEC. 182. An officer performing the duties of another office, during a vacancy, as authorized by sections one hundred and seventy-seven, one hundred and seventy-eight, and one hundred and seventy-nine, is not by reason thereof entitled to any other compensation than that attached to his proper office."

Under these provisions of the Revised Statutes the President made an order as follows:

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

Washington City, District of Columbia:

EXECUTIVE MANSION, October 23, 1882.

I. Chester A. Arthur, President of the United States, do hereby authorize and direct the Second Comptroller in the Department of the Treasury of the United States to perform the duties of the office of the First Comptroller in said Department now and at all times hereafter during the absence from said Department of the said First Comptroller and the Deputy First Comptroller in said Department.

CHESTER A. ARTHUR.

One copy of this order is filed in the office of the First Comptroller, and one in the office of the Second Comptroller, in the Department of the Treasury.

The propriety of such order was suggested by the fact that, on one occasion during the necessary absence of the First Comptroller, the Deputy First Comptroller was detained from his office by severe illness. The order is fully authorized by the statutes.

On the occasion stated the First Comptroller and the Deputy were both absent. The appointment of the First and Second Comptrollers in the Treasury Department "is not vested in the head of the Department." (Rev. Stats., 268.) The First Comptroller is chief of a bureau, and the Deputy is an officer thereof. The First Comptroller is an officer whose "absence" is mentioned in section 178 of the Revised Statutes.

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By the explicit language of section 179 of the Revised Statutes the President may "authorize and direct any other officer in either Department, whose appointment is vested in the President, * until * *, to perform the duties *, the sickness or absence of the incumbent shall cease." It is competent for the President to make a general order applicable to such cases of absence or sickness. He is not required to make an order for each particular case as it arises. (Williams v. The United States, 1 How., 290.)

The purpose of the statute is to authorize the President to provide by a special order in each case of necessity as it may arise, or by a general order which will meet any case or cases as occasion may require.

The order of the President will be filed in this office, in the "Division of Bonds, Contracts, and Powers of Attorney" in the files of communications and orders of the President.*

FIRST COMPTROLLER'S OFFICE,

Treasury Department, November 10, 1882.

* The legislative, executive, and judicial appropriation act of March 3, 1883, provides. "That the Deputy First Comptroller in the Department of the Treasury shall be, and is authorized, in the name of the First Comptroller, to countersign all warrants, except accountable warrants, and to sign all other papers in like manner under the direction of the First Comptroller; and in case of the death, resignation, absence, or sickness of the Deputy First Comptroller, the Secretary of the Treasury may, by an appointment under his hand and official seal, delegate to any officer in the office of the First Comptroller the authority to perform the duties of the Deputy First Comptroller until a successor is appointed or such absence or sickness shall cease."

Under this provision an order was made by the Secretary of the Treasury March 9 1883, as follows:

UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,

TREASURY DEPARTMENT,

Washington City, D. C., March 9, 1883.

It is made to appear to the Secretary of the Treasury, and he so adjudges, that Hon. Jonathan Tarbell, the Deputy First Comptroller in the Department of the Treasury, has been, is, and continues to be, absent from the Department of the Treasury, of the United States by reason of sickness. Now, therefore, in pursuance of the statute in such case made and provided, the Secretary of the Treasury hereby appoints Joseph Addison Thomson, who is an officer in the office of the First Comptroller in said Department, and delegates to said Thomson so appointed the authority to perform the duties of the said Deputy First Comptroller until said sickness and absence of said Deputy First Comptroller shall cease.

In testimony whereof the said Secretary of the Treasury hereto subscribes his name, and affixes the official seal of said Department this ninth day of March, A. D. 1883. [OFFICIAL SEAL OF DEPARTMENT.] CHAS. J. FOLGER,

Secretary, &c.

This was rendered necessary by the sickness and consequent absence of the Deputy First Comptroller since October 5, 1882.

IN THE MATTER OF THE PAYMENT OF LOST REGISTERED BONDS OF THE UNITED STATES, WITH INDORSEMENTS IN BLANK MADE THEREON BY THE PAYEE, BUT WITH NO CERTIFICATES OF THE ACKNOWLEDGMENT OF THE EXECUTION THEREOF. -GIBSON'S CASE.

1. Quære? Whether, if an imperfect assignment is made by the payee in a registered bond of the United States, to a purchaser for sufficient value paid, a court of equity may enjoin the payee from receiving payment of the bond and decree a specific performance of the assignment.

2. The United States may, in a proper case, file a bill of interpleader to determine the rights of adverse parties claiming a right to payment of a registered government bond.

3. The assignee of a chose in action is subject to all the equities between the assignor and the debtor, but the holder of a negotiable instrument indorsed for value in the usual course of business before maturity takes it relieved of such equities, and is entitled to payment as against all the world.

4. Registered bonds of the United States are assignable but not negotiable. They have some, but not all, the attributes of negotiability.

5. The Secretary of the Treasury has authority to prescribe regulations relative to the transfer on the books of the Treasury Department of registered bonds, and to require assignments to be acknowledged before such officers as he may designate as a condition precedent to a right of transfer.

6. The payee in a registered bond, who executes and acknowledges an assignment in blank thereof duly certified, and permits it to pass before maturity to a bona fide purchaser for value in the usual course of business, will generally be estopped from denying the right of such purchaser to a transfer or payment of such bond, especially if such purchaser is without notice in law or fact that the bond was put in circulation with an assignment in blank.

7. The legal title to a registered bond of the United States only passes by a transfer on the books of the Treasury Department, but the right to a transfer is perfect when an assignment in due form is properly filed in the Department.

8. A bond fide purchaser of bonds issued to him by duly authorized officers is generally entitled to be protected (1) against irregularities preceding the issue, and, as it has been held, (2) in case a new bond is issued in lieu of one assigned to him and surrendered for reissue, and (3) in some cases of successive transfers of bonds assigned in blank with a duly certified acknowledgment of execution of assignment.

9. When the payee in a registered bond of the United States in good faith makes an indorsement in blank, and it is lost without any certificate of the acknowledgment of the execution of the assignment thereon, and passes into the hands of a boná fide purchaser for value before maturity, and in the usual course of business, the payee is not estopped from asserting his rights in such bond.

December 28, 1881, Wm. J. Gibson, owning United States registered bonds numbered 50879 and 50880, for $1,000 each, issued under acts of July 17 and August 5, 1861 (12 Stat., 259, 313), and "continued" at 3 per cent., signed his name to the printed indorsements in blank on the back of the bonds in the presence of George Leslie, cashier of the National Bank of Newberry, at Wells River, Vt.; and they were to be by him sold for Gibson. They were then delivered over the counter of the bank to the teller of the bank to enter for sale on the books of the bank. The bank teller took them and laid them on his desk, since which time it is alleged that they have not been seen by Gibson nor by any person connected with the bank, and it is supposed that they were probably burned with the waste paper of the bank. The cashier did not attach his certificate to the printed blank under the signature of Gibson. (See form of blank indorsement in note to Barnett's Case, ante, 203.) The bonds are included in the "108th Call" of the Secretary, stating that they "will be paid at the Treasury of the United States * on the 8th of April, 1882, and that interest on said bonds will cease on that day." They were "under due" to that time. (See 9 Op. Att. Gen., 413.) Application is now made by Gibson to the United States for payment under the call as upon lost or destroyed registered bonds. (1 Lawrence, Compt. Dec., App., ch. 13, 574.)

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The act of July 17, 1861 (12 Stat., 259, sec. 2), under which the bonds were issued, provides that

"The registered bonds shall be transferable on the books of the Treasury on the delivery of the certificate, and the coupon bonds and treasury notes shall be transferable by delivery."

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The act of June 22, 1860 (12 Stat., 79, sec. 2), authorized the issue of registered bonds, or, as they are therein denominated, "certificates of stock for the amount so borrowed, in favor of the parties lending the same, or their assigns, which certificates may be transferred on the books of the Treasury, under such regulations as may be established by the Secretary of the Treasury."

The act of December 17, 1860 (12 Stat., 121), authorized the issue of Treasury notes different in character from other public securities, and provided "That said treasury notes shall be transferable by assignment indorsed thereon by the person to whose order the same may be made payable, accompanied together with the delivery of the note so assigned."* Many of these notes were issued in blank as to payee, others with the name of the payee therein written, and assignments of them were not registered by the Register of the Treasury Department. The act of February 8, 1861 (12 Stat., 129, sec. 2), and the act March 2, 1861 (12 Stat., 178, sec. 2), each contain a provision similar to that in the act of June 22, 1860 (12 Stat., 79, sec. 2), above quoted. The subsequent loan acts authorize loans, and the issue, as evidence of indebtedness, of "coupon or registered bonds of the United States," without any specific provision as to assignment or transfer on the books of the Treasury Department. The registered bonds under all the loan acts have been, by their terms, payable to the payee named "or assigns."

The Secretary of the Treasury has always provided by "regulations"