United States v. Bishop/Opinion of the Court

by John Marshall Harlan

United States Supreme Court

120 U.S. 51

United States  v.  Bishop

This case does not differ in principle from that of U.S. v. Symonds, ante, 411, (just decided.) Bishop is now, and has been for more than four years, a lieutenant commander in the navy. By direction of the secretary of the navy, he assumed the duties of executive officer of the training ship Minnesota, on the eighteenth of April, 1884. During the period of such service that vessel was stationed in New York harbor, cruising and moving about under her own power. Her machinery and equipment were kept in order, and she was perfectly sea worthy, capable, upon short notice, of being used in a protracted cruise. The duties of Bishop, while such executive officer, were more arduous and confining than those of officers of similar grade upon vessels in foreign waters.

For the reasons given in U.S. v. Symonds, ante, 411, we are of opinion that the services of appellee were, within the meaning of section 1556 of the Revised Statutes, performed 'at sea,' and consequently it was rightly adjudged in the court below that he was entitled to sea pay, as established for officers of his grade, during the period of his service on the Minnesota. Judgment affirmed.

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