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TEXAS STATE LIBRARY
law, which will operate upon the guilty without affecting the rights of the innocent, is felt and acknowledged; but to allow those who have no claims except such as are known to be founded in vice, to consummate their iniquities unrebuked, would seem to me to be a consecration of crime by official protection I am aware that it is the opinion of many, that these frauds cannot now be reached, either by Judicial investigation or Legislative enact- ment; and opinion which seems to be founded principally upon two misconceptions of law, to which I would respectfully direct the atten- tion of Congress. First, it is contended that Acts and decisions of the Land Commissioners, in granting certificates are :final and irrevocable, because these commissions were constituted by law, the only and ex- clusive judges of the rights of the parties. And secondly, it is urged that if these Spurious certificates are voidable in the hands of the original holders, they cease to be so, when once assigned for a valuable consideration, to an innocent purchaser. The first of these propositions is met, and I think successfully resisted, by the well established prin- ciple of law and of ethics, that fraud vitiates all transactions that are tainted with it. The indi_vidual who swindles the Government, or a private citizen, out of a just right by forgery or perjury, not only renders himself obnoxious to public punishment upon conviction, but he becomes legally divested of all the rights and benefits acquired by the crime: And as respects the second argument, it would seem to be entitled to some consideration, did the law authorize the transfer of these certificates by assignment. But after a careful examination of the several provisions of the general law on the subject, I can perceive no such authority; but on the contrary, the law by a fair construction of its tenor and spirit seems to contradict such a right, by making it obligatory on the name of each individual to whom Land was granted, together with the date of his Certificate, and the quantity of land it calls for: a requirement which could have been intended for no other purpose than to enable the commissioner-general to make out the patent for the individual to whom the certificate was issued. It is admitted, that by the 12th Section of the Land Law, head-right cl~ims may be · transfered, and the certificate issue to the assignee : provided, he per- forms all that the law requires from the original claimant. But after the certificate has once issued, the law is silent on the subject of transfer-no provision is made for the assignment of the certificates; and for the very good reason, that if they had been permitted to change owners like the circulating medium of the country, and the Patent to be given to the last holder, it would have destroyed all the harmony which the law evidently contemplates between the records of the County Commissioners and those of the General Land Office. Besides, had Congress intended to authorize a transfer of these certificates, the au- thority to make the assignment would certainly have been specifically given, as it is believed that without such express authority, no inchoate title of this description is transferable by assignmept; and the total absence of such authority, superadded to the .fact that the right of transfering the original claim, before the certificate has issued, is ex- pressly conferred, is satisfactory to my mind that Congress intended these certificates should remain in the hands of those to whom they were granted, until the titles were fully consumated and perfected by
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