A claim based upon such
considerations might, it would seem, have been brought within the
definition of a legal claim. But if not admissible under the strict
rules of the Navy Department, it was certainly an equitable demand
against the United States; and Ericsson could not believe that the
representatives of the great American people would stand upon
technicalities. He accordingly made a direct appeal to them in a
Memorial to Congress.
We may as well here give the further history of this claim. It met with
the usual delays and obstructions that private claims, having nothing
but their intrinsic merits to support them, are compelled to
encounter. It called forth the usual amount of legislative
pettifogging. Session after session passed away, and still it hung
between the two Houses of Congress, until the very time which had
elapsed since it was first presented began to be brought up as an
argument against it. At length, when Congress established the Court of
Claims, a prospect opened of bringing it to a fair hearing and a
final decision. It was submitted to that tribunal six years ago. The
Court decided in its favor,--the three judges (Gilchrist, Scarborough,
and Blackford) being unanimous in their judgment.
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