the court will permit; and whether the court gives him more or less than the law authorizes, the Treasury Department is in law bound, to the extent which he is relieved from liability in the particular case by a final judgment, to give him the benefit of it. If it be the judgment of a court of last resort, as the Supreme Court, the principle of law settled by the court should be generally regarded as conclusive; and if it entitles the party sued to a credit with the Government beyond the direct effect of the judgment, he will be entitled to it. The authority of the Supreme Court of the United States should be respected, and on questions of the rights of parties should be conclusive. (5 Op., 84.)

But courts of inferior jurisdiction cannot control the action of executive officers in passing on claims beyond the direct effect of judgments they may render. (Ante, 16, 17; 12 Op., 386; 5 McL., 9; 5 How., 139; 5 Paige, 80; 15 Pet., 141, 377; 16 Pet., 18.)

Third. The remaining inquiry is, can the ruling of my predecessor of February 24, 1879, be now reopened? Certainly, upon the principles stated in the matter of the claim of the Metropolitan Police force, (ante, 57,) it should now be regarded as final. (2 Op., 8; 5 Op., 664; 10 Op., 56; 12 Op., 355; 13 Op., 387, 456; 15 Pet., 377.)

The decision of the Supreme Court, furnishing a rule of law different from that previously adopted by the Executive Department, might, perhaps, furnish a sufficient reason for opening an account previously settled. (5 Op., 84; 10 Op., 56; 12 Op., 355.)

In any view, the application for restatement of the account is denied. TREASURY DEPARTMENT,

First Comptroller's Office, September 1, 1880.

IN THE MATTER OF PAYMENTS TO CHARITABLE CORPORATIONS-PROVIDENCE HOSPITAL CASE.

1. The Surgeon-General of the United States Army having made an authorized contract for the Government with Providence Hospital to pay it a monthly sum for the support of transient paupers, the hospital is not thereby required to give bond as a disbursing agent.

2. Generally, a statute authorizing an officer merely to contract for supplies will not necessarily authorize him to certify vouchers showing the supplies to be furnished.

3. An appropriation act which authorizes the Surgeon-General to contract for the support of paupers carries with it, in view of the usage which has prevailed, an implied authority to certify to services rendered under it, and his certificate is prime facie sufficient.

4. The act of June 23, 1874, (18 Stats., 216,) does not apply to institutions making contracts for the support of paupers in consideration of monthly payments to be made after the services rendered.

5. Form of contract between the Government and Providence Hospital to bind each, without imposing personal liability on the agents making the contract, considered.

6. Where a contract is made by "Joseph K. Barnes, as Surgeon-General of the United States Army, and Sister Beatrice, as Superior of the Providence Hospital, a duly incorporated charity,” and it is presented in support of a voucher for services by the hospital, it will be presumed that the Surgeon-General had sufficient evidence of her authority to make the contract for the hospital.

7. But it will not in such case be presumed that she is the fiscal officer of the hospital authorized to collect money due to it.

8. Under such contract, the account for services, warrant, and draft for payment should be to the hospital-not to officers by name. Then the proper officer, with evidence of authority, can collect dues from the United States and endorse drafts.

9. When the Government is indebted to a corporation, warrants and drafts for payment should run in favor of the corporation, and not in the name of officers even as such, who are liable to change and be supplied by others.

The institution commonly known as "Providence Hospital," in Washington City, is a corporation authorized by act of Congress, of April 8, 1864, (13 Stats., 43,) for charitable purposes, "under the name and style of the directors of Providence Hospital."

The "sundry civil appropriation act” of June 16, 1880, appropriates— "For care, support, and medical treatment of seventy-five transient paupers, medical and surgical patients, in the city of Washington, under a contract to be made with such institution as the Surgeon-General of the Army may select, fifteen thousand dollars."

By virtue of this clause a contract was made as follows:

"This agreement, made this first day of July, in the year one thousand eight hundred and eighty, between Brigadier-General Joseph K. Barnes, as Surgeon-General of the United States Army, and Sister Beatrice, as Superior of the Providence Hospital, a duly incorporated charity in the city of Washington, in the District of Columbia, witnesseth:

"That whereas the Surgeon-General is authorized by an act of Congress, approved June 16, 1880, to contract for the care, support, and medical treatment of seventy-five transient paupers, medical and surgical patients, in the city of Washington:

"The said Sister Beatrice, on behalf of the said Providence Hospital, agrees to keep in readiness at all times, for one year from the date hereof, seventy-five beds, and to receive all patients who may be lawfully sent to the said hospital by the Surgeon-General, under authority of the aforesaid act, to the number of seventy-five; and furnish subsistence and all necessary care, nursing, and medical and surgical treatment to the satisfaction of the Surgeon-General, so long as the same may be necessary.

"And the Surgeon-General agrees, on behalf of the United States, to pay for the said services at the rate of twelve hundred and fifty dollars per month.

"This contract may be terminated by either of the parties to it, by giving to the other thirty days' notice in writing. "JOS. K. BARNES,

"Surgeon-General, U. S. Army.

"SISTER BEATRICE,

"Signed and sealed in the presence of―

"WM. J. NELSON."

"Sup. of Prov. Hospital.

An account was made charging the United States as debtor "To Sister Beatrice, Superior of Providence Hospital," for care, &c., of transient paupers during July, under said contract, $1,250; on which the Surgeon-General certified "that the above account is correct and just, and that the services have been rendered."

The First Auditor, on August 2, 1880, transmitted to the First Comptroller, for his decision thereon, a certificate that the Auditor had "examined and adjusted" (Rev. Stats., 236, 277) an account between the United States and Sister Beatrice, Superior of the Hospital, and found due $1,250, with a voucher, being the account certified by the SurgeonGeneral. These are submitted to the First Comptroller to determine whether a warrant shall issue for the payment of the claim, and, if so, to whom?

DECISION BY WILLIAM LAWRENCE, First Comptroller :

I have considered the questions suggested and arising on the papers transmitted to me.

1. There is no law requiring Providence Hospital or Sister Beatrice, as its agent, to give any bond in connection with the duties assumed for the Government. Under the clause of the appropriation act, by virtue of which the contract of July 1, 1880, was made, it would have been competent for the Surgeon-General to require surety for the faithful performance of the contract. (Jackson vs. Brown, 5 Wend., N. Y., 590.) But the well-known responsibility of the hospital and of the agents managing it rendered this unnecessary.

Each disbursing officer of the Government is required to give a bond; but neither the hospital nor any of its agents is such, nor in any way charged with any duty requiring a bond. (Rev. Stats., 176; Matter of Appropriations, &c., ante, 27.)

The hospital is in the same position as any other contractor who furnishes supplies or renders services in pursuance of law for an agreed

2. The appropriation made by act of June 16, 1880, is, by reason of its terms and by force of the contract made under it, to be applied in making payments at the expiration of each month for services rendered by the hospital during such month, and on vouchers furnished by it. The usage has been in similar cases to accept such vouchers as this. In view of this usage, vouchers duly certified by the SurgeonGeneral are prima facie sufficient. (Den vs. Den, 6 Cal., 81; 26 Vt., 503; 18 Johns., 407; 7 How., 89; 14 Wallace, 1.) Undoubtedly the First Comptroller might go back of these, to ascertain if they ought to have been given; but the official position and high character of the Surgeon-General, as well as that of Sister Beatrice, preclude the necessity of any such inquiry. (Rev. Stats., 236; 14 Op., 419.)

The law requires the accounting officers to be satisfied of the justness of accounts. When the act of June 16, 1880, charged the SurgeonGeneral with the duty to make a contract, and made no other provision as to the supervision of its execution, it may fairly be presumed, in view of the usage in similar cases, that Congress intended such officer to look to the execution.

When a power is given by statute, everything necessary for making it effectual is given by implication. Quando lex aliquid concedit, concedere videtur et id per quod devenitur ad aliud. (When the law grants anything, it also grants that by which the the thing is attained. Coke, 2d Inst., 326; 5 Co., 47; 12 Co., 130, 131; Hob., 234; 3 Kent, Comm., 421; 15 Barb., N. Y., 153, 160.)

It is a rule that, when the provisions of a statute are general, everything which is necessary to make such provisions effectual is supplied by the common law. (Co. Lit., 235; Co. 2d Inst., 222; Bac. Abr. Stat., B.)

Appropriations are made for "contingent expenses" in the Departments, and some of these appropriations regulate the mode of expenditure and of certifying vouchers. (Rev. Stats., 235, 240.) But as to other contingent funds, when no law specifically directs the mode of expenditure, and of certifying vouchers, the usage has been to certify them by the proper officer charged directly by the law, or under authorized "regulation," with the disbursement.

Usage has great force in construing a law, because Congress legislates in view of usage, which becomes part of the law. (Sedgwick, Stats., 215-218.) Optima legum interpres consuetudo. A communi observantia non est recedendum. Communis error facit jus. (2 Eden, ch. 61-74; 1 Burrows, 445; 2 Brod. & B., 598; 1 Abb. Ad. R., 436; 15 Gratt., 457; 16 N. H., 247; 3 Barb. C., 577; LeRoy vs. Beard, 8 How., 468; 5 D. & E., 564; Story, Agency, 73; White vs. V. and M. R., 21 How., 577.)

The power to certify vouchers is an incidental or implied power, and so treated. (Rev. Stats., 60, 76, 172-193, 209, 262, 1001, 1747, 3680-3683, 4781.)

A statute which merely empowers an officer to contract for supplies does not, in the absence of usage or other circumstances showing such to be the purpose of Congress, necessarily authorize him to certify vouchers. But the powers necessary to execute a law must often be implied. (6 Op., 226; 14 Op., 419; Allen vs. Blunt, 3 Story, 742; LeRoy vs. Beard, 8 How., 468; Works of Alexander Hamilton, vol. 1, 138-154; Morgan vs. Mason, 20 Ohio, 408; 6 Ohio St., 495; 14 Ohio St., 18; Co. Lit., 152 a 1; Broom, Leg. Max., 434.)

The officer cannot certify to the expenditure or payment of the money. This must be evidenced by proper receipt. And the powers of officers are not generally to be enlarged by implication, but only in case of manifest necessity, and when such may be fairly deemed the purpose of Congress. (6 Op., 386.)

3. The act of June 23, 1874, (18 Stats., 216,) has no application to the appropriation now under consideration, nor to the hospital in its relations thereto. It relates to institutions for the use, support, or benefit of which appropriations are made to be expended by them, and not to appropriations expended under contracts like that with Providence. Hospital.

The act only applies when the institution is to expend the fund appropriated, and not when it is used to pay for services previously rendered, as in this case. The decision "In the Matter of Appropriations," &c., (ante, 25,) does not go beyond this.

4. (1.) The contract in this case may not be in the best form. (Hunter vs. Field, 20 Ohio, 340.) But it is sufficient; and the intention apparent to impose a duty on the hospital on one side, and the United States on the other, and not a personal obligation on Sister Beatrice or Joseph K. Barnes. (Sheets vs. Selden, 2 Wall., 177; 11 How., 374; 1 Cr., 345; 2 Cr., C. C., 109; 5 Cr., C. C., 520; Story on Agency, sec. 306; Cottrell vs. Thorne, 3 Caines' R., 71, note; Prosen vs. Allen, Gow's R., 117; Macbeath vs. Haldimand, 1 D. & E., 172, 180, 181; Gill vs. Brown, 12 Johns., 385; Belknap vs. Reinhart, per Marcy, J., 2 Wendell, 375; Brown vs. Rundlett, 15 N. H. Rep., 360; Lee vs. Munroe, 7 Cranch, 366; Armstrong vs. U. S., Gilpin R., 399; 2 Kent's Commentaries, 633; 2 Op., 918; Benson's case, 7 Op., p. 88, Cushing, 1855.)

(2.) It will be presumed that the Surgeon-General had satisfactory evidence that Sister Beatrice had authority to make the contract on H. Ex. Doc. 81-7