Joseph Story

“ The court are clearly of opinion, that the right of the collector to forfeitures in rem attaches on seizure, and to personal penalties on suits brought, and in each case it is ascertained and consummated by the judgment; and it is wholly immaterial whether the collector die before or after the judgment. And they are further of opinion, that the case of the surveyor is not, in this respect, distinguishable, in any manner, from that of the collector. ”

“ As the United States have not asserted any claim, the first question for the decision of the court is, whether the present collector and surveyor, the actual incumbents in office, or the representatives of the late collector and surveyor, in right of their testator and intestate, are entitled to the moiety of the money received in satisfaction of the judgment above stated, and now in the custody of the circuit court. ”

“ But it certainly will not support it: the language of the act, in its most obvious import, does not seem to have contemplated any charge in the officers of the customs between the time of the accruing and the receipt of the penalty of forfeiture. It seems principally to have been adapted to cases of the most ordinary occurrence, and it is only by an equitable construction that it can, in aid of the legislative intention, be brought to reach the present case. ”