Joseph McKenna

“ We are forced, therefore, to conclude that appellant's nonaction was deliberate, based upon a consideration of its advantages, with no thought of ultimate assertion against the decision of the government until stirred to acquisitiveness by the decision in the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Case, a decision which we may say in passing, was declared by the Court of Claims to have been improvidently given. B. & O. R. R. Co. ”

“ We do not share it. The mere mechanism of the bills of lading or their false designations of the property transported could not have imposed on anybody, certainly not on 'the auditors and agents' of a railroad company, and the decisions of the Comptroller were as much open to dispute then as now and resort to suit an inevitable prompting, and yet, we have seen, the statute of limitations was permitted to interpose its bar. ”

“ The effect is rather large to attribute to mere nonaction, but we need not make further comment upon it because we think the decision of the Court of Claims was correct. The personal baggage of an officer is not property of the United States and as such entitled to transportation at land-grant rates, and we are brought to the grounds of recovery urged by appellant. ”