Osborn v. United States (91 U.S. 474)

by Stephen Johnson Field

United States Supreme Court

91 U.S. 474

Osborn  v.  United States

ERROR to the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Kansas.

1. Subject to exceptions therein prescribed, a pardon by the President restores to its recipient all rights of property lost by the offence pardoned, unless the property has by judicial process become vested in other persons.

2. A condition annexed to a pardon, that the recipient shall not by virtue of it claim any property, or the proceeds of any property, sold by the order, judgment, or decree of a court, under the confiscation laws of the United States, does not preclude him from applying to the court for the proceeds of a confiscated money-bond secured by mortgage, which were collected by the officers of the court in part by voluntary payment by the obligors, and in part by sale of the lands mortgaged. The condition is only intended to protect purchasers at judicial sale, decreed under the confiscation laws, from any claim of the original owner for the property sold or the purchase-money.

3. The proceeds of property confiscated, paid into court, are under its control until an order for their distribution is made, or they are paid into the hands of the informer entitled to them, or into the treasury of the United States.

4. Where moneys belonging to the registry of the court are withdrawn from it without authority of law, the court can, by summary proceedings, compel their restitution; and any one entitled to the moneys may apply to the court by petition for a delivery of them to him.

Submitted on printed arguments by Messrs. R. M. Corwine, Q. Corwine, J. W. English, Henry Beard, and C. H. Armes, for the plaintiff in error, and by Mr. E. S. Brown for the defendant in error.

MR. JUSTICE FIELD delivered the opinion of the court.

Notes