US SUPREME COURT DECISIONS

The Act of Congress passed on the 7th of May, 1822, 3 Stat. 695, enumerated the ports of Boston, New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Charleston, Savannah, and New Orleans, in which the collector was allowed to receive more than three thousand dollars a year. In the nonenumerated ports, the maximum rate of annual compensation or salary allowed to the office was three thousand dollars.

Mobile was one of the nonenumerated ports, and consequently the salary of the collector at Mobile was not to exceed three thousand dollars, by that act.

This act was not repealed by any of the numerous acts, called additional compensation acts, which were passed from time to time between 1833 and 1841, until one of these temporary acts, viz., the Act of 1838, 5 Stat. 265, was continued in force until otherwise directed by law by the 7th section of the Act for the relief of Chastelain and Ponvert and for other purposes, passed on the 21st of July, 1840. 6 Stat. 815

The history and purport given of the several statutes respecting the compensation of collectors, with the reasons which led to the passage of the act of 1841.

Nor was it repealed by the Act of 3 March, 1841, 5 Stat. 432. There

is no repugnancy between the acts. Repeal by implication, upon the ground that the subsequent provision upon the same subject is repugnant to the prior law, is not favored in any case, but where such repeal would operate to reopen accounts at the Treasury Department long since settled and closed, the supposed repugnancy ought to be clear and controlling before it can be held to have that effect.

By the true construction of this act of 1841, every collector is required to include in his quarter-yearly accounts all sums received by him for rent and storage of goods, wares, and merchandise, stored in the public stores, for which rent is paid beyond the rent paid by him; and if, from such accounting, the aggregate sums received from that source exceed two thousand dollars, he is directed and required to pay the excess into the Treasury as part and parcel of the public money. When the sums so received from that source in any year do not in the aggregate exceed two thousand dollars, he may retain the whole to his own use, and in no case is he obliged to pay into the Treasury anything but the excess, beyond the two thousand dollars.

Collectors of the nonenumerated ports may receive, as an annual compensation for their services, the sum of three thousand dollars from the sources of emolument recognized and prescribed by the act of 7 May, 1822, provided their respective offices yield that amount from these sources, after deducting the necessary expenses incident to the office, and not otherwise, and in addition chanrobles.com-red

Page 63 U. S. 300

thereto, they are also entitled to whatever sum or sums they may receive for rent and storage, provided the amount does not exceed two thousand dollars, but the excess, beyond that sum, they are expressly required to pay into the Treasury as part and parcel of the public money. chanrobles.com-red

Page 63 U. S. 303