To Thomas Jefferson from Caesar A. Rodney, 19 March 1805
From Caesar A. Rodney
Wilmington March 19th. 1805.
Honored & Dear Sir,
I received your favor of the 8th. inst: by the mail on the subject of mr Cope’s new theory of the magnet & shall embrace the earliest opportunity of making the communication to him which you desire.
You are well acquainted with the material facts & circumstances relative to the ship Favourite & her cargoe, which was by the weather cast ashore near Lewistown. We have been engaged in the trial of a court, which is not yet concluded, between the owners & those who claim as the salvors of the cargoe, for a week past.
Among other grounds of defence on which we resist this claim of salvage, to a moiety of the cargoe, we shew that the salvors by their mal-conduct have forfeited the cargoe to the U.S. by a breach of the revenue laws. That altho’ the U.S. may relinquish to us this forfeiture, because we were innocent, yet then we receive the property from their hands & not from those of the salvors, the plain English of whose claim, is in fact nothing more nor less than this: For having forfeited the whole of your cargoe to the U.S. we now claim of you the value of a moiety.
On the second day of the trial, the District judge (G. Bedford) delivered to us a letter from judge Winchester to him, containing a summary of a case, together with the arguments of council & the decision of the court, determined by himself.
This adjudication extends the whole lenth of deciding that salvage goods are not liable to the payment of duties & can not therefore be forfeited by any misconduct of the salvors.
I have sent on to Mr. Gallatin a copy of the above letter, considering the revenue of the U.S. as deeply affected by such a decision, & have taken the liberty to give you a sketch of the business.
What Bedford’s decision will be I know not but the District Attorney & myself are determined to use every exertion to protect the interests of the U.S.
With great esteem & regard I remain Dr. Sir Yours Very Sincerely
C. A. Rodney
RC (DLC); endorsed by TJ as received 25 Mch. and so recorded in SJL.
For the case arising from the salvage of the ship (Favourite), see TJ to George Read, Jr., 10 Feb.
James Winchester, the federal judge for the district of Maryland, sent a summary of a case involving the ship Blaireau, which he ruled on in July 1803. The Blaireau was a French vessel, disabled en route from Martinique to Bordeaux by a Spanish boat and subsequently salvaged by a British ship, part of the crew of which sailed the Blaireau, at heavy risk, to Baltimore. Although that case, which ultimately was appealed to the Supreme Court, mostly involved questions related to the amount and distribution of the salvage, Winchester did rule “that salvage goods were not dutiable.” In a response to Rodney’s letter of 19 Mch. (not found), Gallatin recalled having “heard of the decision in the case of the Blaireau” and of a similar case. The distinction, as he understood it, was that the salvage did not involve goods being imported from a foreign port (since their original destination was not the United States). The salvage of the Blaireau could be treated “on the same principle that fish & oil taken at sea by American vessels pay no duty.” The salvage of the Favorite, by contrast, involved a ship bound for an American port and disabled in American waters, so U.S. revenue laws should apply (William Cranch, Reports of Cases Argued and Adjudged in the Supreme Court of the United States, 1801-1815, 9 vols. [Washington, D.C., 1804-17], 2:240-71; 4:355-6; Gallatin to Rodney, 22 Mch., in , 10:754).
Bedford’s decision: the district court at Wilmington ruled against the federal government’s contention that the cargo salvaged from the Favorite should be treated as a forfeiture and ordered the sale of the goods so that salvage could be distributed. The decision was upheld by the circuit court. Gallatin, who had authorized Rodney’s employment as a co-counsel to U.S. attorney George Read, continued to pursue the case, fearing that the “decision of the Delaware district judge leaves the revenue officers in a very awkward situation, injures the revenue itself, and encourages plunderers.” In a unanimous Supreme Court opinion delivered on 9 Mch. 1808, however, John Marshall ruled that the “libels filed on the part of the United States were properly dismissed” (, 10:782; 11:287; 13:365; Wilmington Mirror of the Times, & General Advertiser, 8 May 1805; Cranch, Reports, 4:347-66; Herbert A. Johnson, Charles T. Cullen, Charles F. Hobson, and others, eds., The Papers of John Marshall, 12 vols. [Chapel Hill, 1974-2006], 7:166-72).