<;:ao would remain unsatisfied. So it came to pass that when he died in 1805 , his las t wi ll and testam ent bequeathed the claim to his family, destined to become a very long-lived lawsuit. T ime after tim e throughout the nineteenth century, French spoliation claimants, including clamoring widows, orphans, doubtfully- related cousins, brothers-inlaw, insurance company underwriters and get-rich-quickers who bought assigned interests, submitted memorials to Congress seeking private bills to pay them off. The m ain instigator was a former sailor and scion of a Baltimore merchant family named Jam es H . Causren. He traveled from ciry to ciry, solici ting prominent fami lies to retain him as a claims representative on contingent fee (i n 1836 the poet Edgar Allan Poe asked Causren to collect on a Revolutio nary War loan voucher inherited through Poe's aunt by marriage). Causren's printed circular advertised that one spoliation case at "one hundred fourteen thousand dollars wo uld, at six percent compound interest annually, have produced in the intervening sixry-five years, a sum exceeding fi ve millio n." Tenacious and indefati gable, thro ughout most of his life Causten would pursue claims arising from the American Revolution, the Quasi-WarTreary of 1801 , rhe Lo uisiana Purchase of 1803, rhe War of 18 12, rhe Spanish cession of Florida in 18 19, and another French Treary of 183 1. Causren organized a convention of claiman ts in N ew York Ciry in 1845, and their concerted lobbying persuaded Congress ro pass a bill authorizing paym ent, bur in 1846 President Polk vetoed it. Ten yea rs later they managed to persuade Congress to pass another bill, bur President Pierce vetoed this one in 1855 . Still again, rhe lobbyists pushed for rheir boondoggle bill, and fin ally President Chester Arthur signed it. In 1886- more than eighry years after rhe ini tial French captures-claimants finall y go r their day in US Claims Court. The resulting lirigarions, collectively known as rhe French Spoliation Cases, toge ther with some Native American tribal land disputes, are contenders for rhe distinction of being the most long-lived lawsuits in US history. The C laims Court was still sifting through complaints about French priva teering fro m the 1790s as late as 191 2. SEA HISTORY 113 , WINTER 2005-2006
The age of the cases naturally presented problems of proof. Wars and hurricanes dispersed colonial island records; a French court clerk destroyed reams of critical files when, never dreaming of indemnities claims, he sold them to a grocer as waste paper. Litigants more often than not came away emp ry-handed . Even when they won, they did nor win much. The Claim s Court refused to award rhe exponentially- multiplied compound inreresr which had so enthralled James Causten . Worse, a quirk of the law made rhe court's decisions only advisory. Successful litigants had to beseech Congress for special appropriations to pay them. O verall, of an estimated $20 mi ll io n in American shipping losses during rhe Quasi-War with France, by 1915 rhe judges and Congress had awarded o nly $3 million to latter-day claimants. Too little, too late fo r Causten. H e died in 1874, twelve years before the court convened on the first of the cases he labored a lifetime to bring to the bar. Thirry-fo ur years later, another lawsuit made it all the way to the US Supreme Court regarding who was entirled to Causren's contingent fees. Earle v. Myers, 207 US 244 (1 907) was a laws uit about defun ct lawsuits between lawyers for dead lawyers. The argument was whether a contract to lobby Congress was an enterprise so reprehensible, so inherenrly corrupt, as to be unenforceable. The Supreme Court confirmed lower court
John Davis, Chief j udge of the new!.yestablished US Claims Court in 1886, wrote the seminal op inion allowing heirs of claimants to recover French spoliation indemnities, ninety years after the fact.
Congressman Daniel Webster collaborated with lobbyist James Causten on sp oliation claims. Webster, in his cap acity as a private lawyer, took a 5% fee, though he disclaimed any financial interest as a legislator in the outcome of Causten's cases.
rulings rhar awarded Causten's heirs legitimate legal fees but disallowed fees for influ ence peddling. To return to the schooner Mary and what final ly becam e of her-as it happens, some of Captain Yellorr's collateral descendants discovered how to turn to legal advantage the complexities of the situation in rhe Quasi-War. Maryland lawyer and state Senator Coleman Yellott and his brother and law partner Washington Yellott realized that the 1801 rreary with France had released only claims against the French privateers. There was no such release against the Durch authorities who improperly ordered M ary's condemnation. In 1829 the lawyers filed an action against the Netherlands. They prevailed, winning damages of $62,692, though it seems to have been a futile exercise. The restored Durch sovereign's ministers refused to acknowledge liabiliry for any misdeed of the short-lived Baravian Republic. This was long before the advent of twentieth-century inrernarional conventions affording procedures for a private litigant to enforce a judgment against a foreign power. The question of restitution for rhe loss of M ary and her cargo in 1800 lingers on, caught and preserved, perhaps, forever in the dessicaring interstices of international law. Jock Yellott is a former maritime lawyer, now a writer and art collector. H e welcomes inquires about the French spoliation cases and can be reached at311 East M arket St., Charlottesville, VA 22902 .
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