They have reversed the decree of the court below, and the case is remanded with directions to dismiss the bill. The discussion of the case in all its aspects, given in the opinion delivered by Mr. Justice Swayne, is thorough and comprehensive. His language is very plain. In the first place, he points out that the lawyer's claim could not possibly affect that part of the fund in the Treasury to which it had no relation; although he kindly adds that "this feature of the decree was doubtless the result of oversight and inadvertence." More than this, he finds that Child had no lien upon the fund. "The understanding between the elder Child and Trist was a personal agreement. It could in no wise produce the effect insisted upon. For a breach of the agreement the remedy was at law, not in equity, and the defendant had a constitutional right to a trial by jury.”· To these serious objections the learned judge adds another that is fatal, and which it seems most extraordinary that the court of the District should have overlooked. With a proper solicitude in behalf of petitioners for relief from the public purse, Congress provided by a standing law, approved February 26, 1853 (10 Statutes at Large, 170), that "all transfers and assignments hereafter made of any claim upon the United States, or any part or share thereof, or interest therein, whether absolute or conditional, and whatever may be the consideration therefor, . . . shall be absolutely null and void, unless the same shall be freely made and executed in the presence of at least two attesting witnesses, after the allowance of such claim, the ascertainment of the amount due, and the issuing of a warrant for the payment thereof." It was a part of the case that the alleged agreement between Trist and the elder Child was made at the outset of the business, and there was no pretence that it had been renewed or confirmed in any way subsequent to the passage of the act of Congress. In view of these very precise provisions of the statute, obviously made to meet exactly this class of cases, it is difficult to understand why the officers of the Treasury assented to the lawyer's demand to suspend the payment. It would seem that they should always require the exhibition of proof of transfer, executed at the time and with the formalities prescribed by the statute.

...

But the work of the Supreme Court would have been far from complete if the opinion had stopped with these considerations, decisive as they are against the claim of Child. After having

quietly pointed them out in their due order, Mr. Justice Swayne proceeds to say that there is an objection of still greater gravity to the appellee's case; and then points out that the contract, or alleged contract, was invalid from the beginning. "In our jurisprudence," he says, "a contract may be illegal and void, because it is contrary to a constitution or statute, or inconsistent with sound policy or good morals." He cites Lord Mansfield that "many contracts which are not against morality are still void, as being against the maxims of sound policy;" and adds that "it is a rule of the common law, of universal application, that where a contract, express or implied, is tainted with either of the vices last named, as to the consideration or the thing to be done, no alleged right founded upon it can be enforced in a court of justice."

The character of the services actually rendered by the Childs, father and son, are so well illustrated by two letters, which form a part of the evidence, that we subjoin them at length. A portion of one of them is quoted by Judge Swayne in the opinion of the Court.

[FROM CHILD To Trist.]

WASHINGTON, May 25, 1870.

MY DEAR MR. TRIST, Since I saw you I have had an interview with Senator Cameron]. He enters heartily into your case; says that he will do all in his power to secure a favorable report from the committee, and I will do all in his power to carry it through.

I also afterwards had the good fortune to see Senators S[umner] and C[ameron] together, and we three had another conversation about your case. C[ameron] told Senator S[umner] that you ought to have your claim. S[umner] said, "I think so too," and said, "Do you think that there is any difficulty in carrying it through our committee ?" C[ameron] replied: "I think there will be no difficulty with our committee." Mr. S[umner] replied, "I think so too." Mr. S[umner] then said to me as follows: "I want to get this thing through for the benefit of Mr. Trist."

Mr. S[umner] says he will bring the matter before the committee next Tuesday, and if the committee go in favor of it, he will report it to the Senate, with a written report recommending its passage. And as soon as the committee agrees to report, he will write me that I may come on to Washington at once. I will inform you at what time I shall be at Washington again. Very truly yours,

LINUS CHILD.

MR. TRIST,- Every thing looks very favorable. I found that my father has spoken to A[rcher] and B[anks] and other members. Mr. B[anks] says he will "try hard" to get it before the House. He has two more chances, or rather "morning hours," before Congress adjourns. A[rcher] will go in for it. D[awes] promises to go for it. I have sent your letter and report to Mr. W[oodward], of Pa. It may not be reached till next week. Please write to your friends to write immediately to any member of Congress. Every vote tells; and a simple request to a member may secure his vote, he not caring any thing about it. Set every man you know at work, even if he knows a page, for a page often gets a vote. The most I fear is indifference. Yours, &c.,

L. M. CHILD.

The whole American people will cordially thank the Supreme Court for its authoritative expression that services of this kind cannot be the basis of any valid contract for compensation. Judge Swayne well says that the foundation of our republic is the virtue of its citizens; that the theory of our government is that all public stations are trusts, and that those clothed with them are to be animated in the discharge of their duties solely by considerations of right, justice, and the public good; and that there is a reciprocal duty resting upon the citizen; in his intercourse with those in authority, whether executive or legislative, touching the performance of their functions, he is bound to exhibit truth, frankness, and integrity. Any departure from the line of rectitude in such cases is not only bad in morals, but involves a public wrong.

A reservation is made in respect to purely professional services, for which a just compensation may be recovered. "Within this category," says Judge Swayne, "are included drawing the petition to set forth the claim, attending to the taking of testimony, collecting facts, preparing arguments and submitting them orally or in writing to a committee or other proper authority, and other services of like character." "But such services," he adds, "are separated by a broad line of demarcation from personal solicitation and the other means and appliances which the correspondence shows were resorted to in this case."

And,

finally, the opinion points out (and this a point of great practical importance) that the blending of proper services with those which are inadmissible vitiates all claim to compensation for either.

We have said that this authoritative exposition of law will be hailed with lively satisfaction. It remains to be considered whether, by declaring improper services beyond the provisions of any valid contract for compensation, it will prove effective to remove wholly or in any considerable degree the grossly evil practices which it so strongly condemns. That it will have a beneficial effect in this direction, of course, cannot be doubted. It will, at any rate, drive from the field of "lobbying " all persons who have not wholly lost their own respect, or who pretend to maintain an honest position as counsellors or advocates. The opinion has a kind word for the "ability and high character" of the late Mr. Child, and intimates that his son is said to be equally worthy;" but hereafter no practitioners can expect toleration for such proceedings as are described in the letters quoted. Such proceedings, if they are continued, will be practised wholly by parties of less degree, professionally, socially, or morally.

66

It ought not to be, but most persons acquainted with the actual conduct of business at Washington, we think, will say that it is, a practical question, whether a private bill can be passed through Congress without the assistance of some such means and appliances as those which the Court condemns; condemns, at least, when they are made the subject of contract and payment, although the opinion appears to allow them (within proper limits, it must be supposed) when they are gratuitously rendered.

-

One thing is certain, that Mr. Trist, who was a veteran in public affairs at the seat of government, described by Benton as a man of the highest integrity and utmost purity of character, with all his observation and experience believed it necessary, or at least expedient, to employ assistance in securing the passage of the bill for his relief.

If Mr. Trist was right in this opinion, and if services of this sort are necessary to honest claimants, the next question is, What more is needed after this opinion of the court to wholly remove the evil?

It will perhaps aid us in the consideration of these questions if

we review, rapidly, but in detail, the history of this particular claim. We will begin by stating that the act of Congress which settled the claim before that body and was the beginning of the proceedings in the courts, is chapter thirty-five of the acts passed at the first session of the forty-second Congress, and was approved by the President on the twentieth of April, eighteen hundred and seventy-one. We give this description with precision, because the act is cited only by its date, and that is wrongly given in the printed copies which we have seen of the opinion of the Court. The forty-second Congress, it will be remembered, held a short session (forty-eight days only) immediately on its organization, on the 4th of March, 1871. This act was passed at that session, and is printed in the course of three pages containing the private acts, in a very thin pamphlet, of the series which has been interrupted by the substitution of another system for publishing the laws, incident to the enactment of the Revised Statutes of the United States.

Nicholas P. Trist, of Virginia, was chief clerk in the Department of State, under Mr. Buchanan as Secretary of State and Mr. Polk as President, when on the 13th of May, 1846, war was declared to exist "by the act of the republic of Mexico;" and within less than a year from that date, namely, on the 15th of April, 1847, while the war was still in progress and apparently pressed with vigor, he was sent to Mexico to negotiate a peace, being accredited with full powers for that purpose, under the title of commissioner. He applied himself so diligently to the duty with which he had been intrusted that the administration became alarmed, and recalled him by instructions (Mr. Benton says) dated the 6th of October but which did not reach him until the 16th of November, at about which date the Mexican government had appointed commissioners to treat with him. Mr. Trist did not comply with the instruction to return, but continued his negotiations, and in effect concluded on the 2d of February in the following year the treaty known as the Treaty of Guadaloupe Hidalgo, substantially as it was subsequently ratified and now stands among the binding treaties of the nation. Mr. Trist returned to Washington in June, 1848, to encounter the enmity of the administration. His pay had been stopped by order of the President at November 16, 1847. Meanwhile, however, he had sent home his treaty; it had been substantially ac