319
PAPERS OF MIRABEAU BuoNAPARTE LAMAR
tions, who has r.eceived no titles himself, can claim none and has none to confer. It was upon this view of the 12th. section of: the Land Law,53 that I founded my constitutional objections to the bill which I felt constrained to return to you on yesterday, without my approval; nor does this view of the subject present to my mind any difficulty or cmbarrasment in the investigation of the frauds which may have been committed. If the claim has been assigned, it is made the duty of the assignee to produce the same proofs to the board of Land Commissioners, before he can obtain a certificate that would have been required of the original claim- ant had the assignment not been made; and if he perpetrate a fraud, in obtaining the certificate that fraud can be enquired into as· well as if the certificate had been obtained by the original claimant. It is the person who obtains . the certificate that perpetrates the fraud, and as these certificates are not as:c:ignable by law, the fraud practiced in ob- taining them continues to attach to them in whose hands soever they may afterwards be found, and may properly and constitutionally become the subject of investigation. When the new Commissioners·appointed by the bill to investigate the frauds, commence their duties, I would respectfully ask upon what will they predicate their action? I answer upon the certificates of the board of the Land Commissioners; and if in their investigation, it iR found thu1. a claim is illegal and unfounded, it matters not who obtained the certificate, whether the assignee or the original claimant himseff they both stand in the same relation to the Government, and the fraud may be as readily enquired into and as easily detected, if practiced by the one as the other. · In order that the Congress may see that. the views which I now ex- press are in strict accordance with those prel;ented in my anual J\Ies- sage54 at the commencement of the present session, I beg leave to refer them to the 20th. and 21st. pages of that document as printed by the order of the honorable body. An extract cannot be made without weak- ening the General force of the argument, but as the paragraph is too lengthy to incorporate in this communication, I will only quote the following sentences: "It is admitted that by the 12th. section of the Land Law, headright claims may be transferred, and the certificate- issued to the consignee, provided, he performs all that the law requires· from the original claimant. But after the certificate has once [been l 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 the [sic] had been permitted to change owners, like the circulH.t- ing medium of the country, and the patent tq be given to the last holder, it would have destroyed all the harmony which the law evid.:mtly con- templated between the records of the County _Commissioners and those of the General Land Office." Now, it will be perceived by this that I then distinctly recognised the right of assignment of head-right claims previous to issuing the certificates but repudiated the legality of any transfer of the certificates when once issued; And it was upon the very good ground that because it was the assignee of the claim who was re- quired to make the proofs by law, to obtain the certificate that I alleged
""See note 02 above. "'No. 1529.
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