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What occasion, then, was there for any interference in this case by the Executive Government of the United States to control or direct the action of the Court? Are not treaties, and all the duties imposed by them in regard to property in litigation, obligatory on the Court, as the supreme law of the land, as much without the intervention of the Executive as with it? Did the suggestion, that the claims of Ruiz and Montez were urged by the Spanish minister, add any thing to their strength or justice? Ought it, in any way, to influence or affect the decision of the Court?

For what purpose, then, I again ask, do the United States appear in these proceedings? They make no allegations, and put no fact in issue in regard to the Africans. They admit the jurisdiction of the Court; and claim no interest of their own to be affected by its decision. The question of freedom or slavery was in issue only between Ruiz and Montez and the Africans. It was decided in favor of the Africans, by a court whose jurisdiction was expressly admitted by the Spanish libellants. Between those parties, therefore, it was conclusively decided not only that the Africans were not the property of Ruiz and Montez (9 Wheaton, 410; 8 Peters, 4-10; 9 Wheaton, 367,) but that they were not property, but freemen, in possession of all their natural rights. 

As Ruiz and Montez have not appealed from this decision, and the Spanish minister has never authorized an appearance or an appeal in his behalf, (See Doc. 185, H. R. 1840, and Senate Doc. 179, 1841,) it follows that there is no allegation by any party before this court, that the Africans are the property of any one, or indeed that they are property;--a fact, the establishment of which, as has already been remarked, lies at the very foundation of the jurisdiction of any court or department of the Government in regard to them. And the only allegation that is made, namely, that they have been demanded as property, by the Spanish minister, to be surrendered to their owners, is utterly untrue. For the Chevalier de Argaiz, in his letter to Mr. Forsyth, of Nov. 26, 1839, expressly declares "that the legation of Spain does not demand the delivery of slaves, but of assassins." Yet it is under process issued on that suggestion merely, that they are now detained in custody, after a judicial decision in favor of their freedom, from which the Spanish libellants have not appealed. 

Who, then, can again draw in question a fact thus solemnly decided? By whom is it attempted? What is the issue this Court is called upon to decide? and between what parties is it made?