Syllabus.

statute arbitrarily singles out one class of debtors and punishes it for a failure to perform certain duties duties which are equally obligatory upon all debtors; a punishment not visited by reason of the failure to comply with any proper police regulations, or for the protection of the laboring classes, or to prevent litigation about trifling matters, or in consequence of any special corporate privileges bestowed by the State." The conclusion was that the subjection of railroad companies only, to the penalty, was purely arbitrary, not justifiable on any reasonable theory of classification, and that the statute denied the equal protection of the law demanded by the Fourteenth Amendment. In this case the act was passed "for the protection of servants and employés of railroads," and was upheld as an amendment of railroad charters, such exercise of the power reserved being justified on public considerations, and a duty was specially imposed for the failure to discharge which the penalty was inflicted. The penalty was sustained because the requirement was valid.

Judgment affirmed.

PRICE v. FORREST.

ERROR TO THE COURT OF ERRORS AND APPEALS OF THE STATE OF NEW JERSEY.

No. 105. Argued January 3, 4, 1899. - Decided March 6, 1899.

In 1850 Price, a purser in the Navy and fiscal agent for that Department, advanced $75,000 to the Government, from his private fortune, to meet emergencies. His right to receive it back was questioned, and was not settled until 1891, when Congress passed an act directing the Secretary of the Treasury to adjust his account "on principles of equity and justice," and to pay to him "or to his heirs" the sum found due him on such adjustment. It was adjusted by the Secretary, and in August, 1892, it was decided that there was due to Price from the United States $76,204.08. Meanwhile Forrest had recovered in the courts of New Jersey, of which Price was a citizen and resident, a judgment against him for $17,000. Forrest died in 1860 without having collected the amount of this judgment. In 1874 his widow, having been appointed administratrix of his

Opinion of the Court.

estate, caused the judgment to be revived by writ of scire facias and asked for the appointment of a receiver. Price appeared and answered, and then the cause slept until August, 1892, when Mrs. Forrest filed a petition, stating that money was about to be paid to Price by the United States on his claim, and asking for the appointment of a receiver of the Treasury draft, and that Price be ordered to endorse it to the receiver, to the end that the amount might be received by him as an officer of the court and disposed of according to law. A receiver was appointed, gave bond and entered on his duties. Price died in 1894. He left no will. No letters of administration were granted, but the New Jersey court appointed an administrator ad prosequendum. The bill in this case was then filed. The relief sought was, the revival of the bill of 1874, that the administrator ad prosequendum be made a party, and that the other parties be enjoined from receiving the money from the Treasury, and that the receiver be authorized to receive and dispose of it under the orders of the court. The heirs of Price set up their claims to it. The court held that the plaintiffs were entitled to the moneys in the Treasury and its judgment was affirmed by the highest court in the State. Held, that the receiver, and not the heir, was the person entitled to recover the money from the United States; and that the case did not come within the prohibitory provisions against assignments of claims against the United States, contained in Rev. Stat. § 3477.

THE case is stated in the opinion.

Mr. John C. Fay and Mr. Flavel McGhee for plaintiffs in

error.

Mr. Cortlandt Parker and Mr. R. Wayne Parker for defendants in error. Mr. Frank W. Hackett was on their brief.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN delivered the opinion of the court.

The ultimate question in this case is whether the plaintiffs in error, as heirs of Rodman M. Price, are entitled to receive from the United States the amount standing to the credit of the deceased on the books of the Treasury, and which represents the balance of a sum found in his lifetime under the authority of a special act of Congress to be due him upon an adjustment of his accounts as a purser in the Navy.

The facts out of which arise the questions of law discussed by counsel are as follows:

In the year 1848 the decedent was assigned to duty on the Pacific Coast in California as purser and fiscal agent of the

Opinion of the Court.

United States for the Department of the Navy. He acted in that capacity until about December, 1849, or January, 1850, when he was detached from such service and ordered to transfer all public money and property remaining in his hands to his successor, or to such other disbursing officer of the Navy as might be designated by the commanding officer at the naval station at California, and immediately after such transfer to report at the city of Washington for the purpose of settling his accounts.

A. M. Van Nostrand was his successor, in California, as acting purser in the Navy.

About December 31, 1849, Commodore Jones of the Navy, commanding the United States squadron at San Francisco, directed Van Nostrand to receive from Price all books, papers, office furniture and funds on hand belonging to the purser's department at that city. Thereupon Price turned over to Van Nostrand as acting purser of the Navy at San Francisco, forty-five thousand dollars, that being all the public money remaining in his hands.

Subsequently on the 14th day of January, 1850, and out of his private funds alone, Price advanced to Van Nostrand seventy-five thousand dollars, taking a receipt therefor as follows: "San Francisco, January 14, 1850. Received from Rodman M. Price, purser-U. S. Navy, seventy-five thousand dollars, for which I hold myself responsible to the United States Treasury Department, $75,000. (Duplicate.) A. M. Van Nostrand, acting purser." This money was so advanced without the approval and signature of Commodore Jones,

Van Nostrand never returned the $75,000 or any part of it to Price, nor did he account for it to the Government.

Price insisted that the United States should reimburse him for the amount so advanced by him, but the officers of the Government denied its liability to him on that account. In an elaborate opinion, given March 12, 1854, Attorney General Cushing held that, while the appointment of Van Nostrand as acting purser was lawful and valid under the circumstances, the Government could not be charged with the private funds paid to him by Price, although the latter be

Opinion of the Court.

lieved at the time that his advance of money to the former was an accommodation to the Government in the then unsettled condition of California. 6 Opin. Atty. Gen. 357.

Finally, by an act approved February 23, 1891, c. 279, 26 Stat. 1371, entitled "An act for the relief of Rodman M. Price," the Secretary of the Treasury of the United States was "authorized and directed to adjust upon principles of equity and justice the accounts of Rodman M. Price, late purser in the United States Navy and acting navy agent at San Francisco, California, crediting him with the sum paid over to and receipted for by his successor, A. M. Van Nostrand, acting purser, January 14, 1850, and pay to said Rodman M. Price, or his heirs, out of any money in the Treasury not otherwise appropriated, any sum that may be found due him upon such adjustment."

Under the authority conferred by that act the Secretary of the Treasury, in August, 1892, adjusted the accounts of Price; and in that adjustment he was credited with the sum advanced to Van Nostrand, leaving due to him from the Government the sum of $76,204.08, which of course included the above sum of $75,000.

In order that the precise questions to be determined upon this writ of error may be clearly apprehended we must now refer to certain matters occurring in the courts of New Jersey both prior to and shortly after the passage of the above act of February 23, 1891.

In the year 1857 Samuel Forrest recovered in the Supreme Court of New Jersey a judgment against Rodman M. Price for the sum of $17,000 and costs. Execution upon that judgment was returned unsatisfied. Forrest died in 1860 intestate. In 1874 his wife, one of the present defendants in error, was appointed and qualified as administratrix of his estate. In the same year she sued out a writ of scire facias to revive the above judgment, and it was revived. In the bill seeking a revivor of the judgment she alleged facts tending to show that Price had an interest in certain lands, and also that he had equitable things in action or other property to the amount of many thousand dollars, exclusive of all claims thereon and

Opinion of the Court.

of all exemptions allowed by law, which she had been unable to reach by execution on the above judgment. By that bill the administratrix also prayed discovery from Price of all property, real or personal, whether in possession or action, belonging to him, with full particulars in relation thereto, and that the same under the order of court be appropriated in satisfaction of such judgment; further, that a receiver be appointed in the cause to collect and take charge of the property, money or things in action found to belong to Price, or to which he was in any way entitled, either in law or equity, with power to convert the same into money, and with such other powers as were usually granted to receivers in similar cases; and that Price be enjoined from assigning, transferring or making any other disposition of the real estate and personal property to which he was in anywise entitled and from receiving any moneys then due or to become due to him, except where the same were held in trust or the funds held in trust proceeded from other persons than himself.

The defendants to that bill were Price and his wife and son, the latter being alleged to claim some interest in the property described in the bill. They appeared and filed an answer, Price denying that any part of the properties mentioned in the bill belonged to him, or that he had any interest in them. After the filing of that answer the cause slept until August 9, 1892, when Mrs. Forrest, as administratrix of the estate of her husband, filed a petition stating that since the filing of her bill of complaint in that cause no payment had been made on the judgment against Price, and that neither she nor her solicitors had been able to find any personalty or real estate belonging to Price by levy upon and sale of which any part of the amount due on the judgment could be obtained; that it had lately come to her knowledge that about $45,000 was about to be paid to Price by officers of the Treasury of the United States as the sum found to be due him by an accounting then lately had between him and the Government; that that sum was to be paid by the delivery to Price or to his attorneys of a draft of the Treasurer of the United States or some other negotiable security made or issued by its financial