Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 10.djvu/94

83 FEDERAL REPORTER. �Under instructions from the commissioner of customs, dafed Mardi 24,' 1881, the collector of the port of New York paid to the plaintifs 12,296.90, the amount of the judgment, which was paid and received -without prejudice to the claims of the plaintiffs for interest on the judgment from March 1, 1881. The plaintiffs have never executed any satisfaction piece of the judgment, because the commissioner of cus- toms directed the collector not to require one, in order to enable the plaintiffs to procure a judicial determination of the legality of the said decision of the commissioner of customs of March 16, 1881. �The plaintiffs have not applied to the supreme court for a man- daraus to compel the secretary of the treasury or other officer to pay the interest in question, but the United States attorney now applies to this court, on the foregoing facts, to require the plaintiffs to exe- cute and deliver a full and complete satisfaction piece of the judg- ment, or to make an order that full and complete satisfaction of the judgment be entered on the records of the court. �Although the commissioner of customs directed the collecter not to require a satisfaction piece, it must be assumed that the present application is made with the consent of the treasury department, and that although it is in form an application by the defendant, it is also an application by the government for the purpose of obtaining a judi- cial decision as to the liability of the government to pay the interest. It is so treated by both parties. The United States attorney relies wholly on the views taken in the decision in Stephani's Case. If the governmenVis liable for the interest, the plaintiffs ought not to be required to now enter satisfaction. But the further question arises whether the plaintiffs are now bound to enter satisfaction, even though the government may not be liable for the interest. �1. The question of the liability of the government to pay tho inter- est will be flrst considered. The Case of Stephani was a judgment against a collector of internai revenue to recdver back taxes illegally exacted. It arose under section 989. There was a certificate of probable cause, and the question was whether interest should be paid from the date of that certificate. In his decision the first comp- troller says that the practice theretofore in his office had been "to allow interest on judgments from the date of the certificate of prob- able cause to the time of filing the judgment in the treasury depart- ment for payment." He holds that the expression "the amount so recovered," in section 989, "as applied to the governmeiit, ihcludes only the sum of the judgment and costs;" that the government is not liable to pay interest by force of section 966, which provides that ��� �