A part of it, he charges, was forcibly taken by the military
forces of the Government and converted to its use or destroyed while
being transported to its destination, and the remainder of it, having
been detained in storage at Richmond, Va., was afterwards appropriated
to the use of the United States or was destroyed in the fires at
Richmond upon the capture of the city by the United States forces in
1865.
An action predicated upon the contract with Risley was brought by Maddox
in the Court of Claims to recover the value of this property, but it was
held by the court that the contract was void.
On appeal to the Supreme Court of the United States the decision of the
Court of Claims was affirmed, upon the ground, as had been previously
decided by said court, that under the law, the Treasury regulations,
and the Executive orders concerning the purchase of products of
insurrectionary States a purchasing agent of the Government had no
authority to negotiate with anyone in relation to the purchase of such
products unless at the time of the negotiation the party either owned
or controlled them; that neither the law nor the regulations for its
execution protected a speculation wherein the products to be sold were
to be procured by the contractor within the rebel lines after the
contract was made; that private citizens were prohibited from trading at
all in the insurrectionary districts, and that the object of the law and
the regulations to carry it into effect was to encourage the insurgents
themselves to bring their products to agents of the Government.
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