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HEPBURN'S CASE. 121
of procuring any immediate relief; but he is not allowed to obtain
testimony by a bill of discovery in equity, so as thereby to lay a
foundation for obtaining relief elsewhere, that is, by attachment or
otherwise from the property of our citizens in the aliens own
country or elsewhere, (u)
It is clear then, upon principle, that there was nothing in the
circumstances of the Mollisons having been non-resident alien ene-
mies by which the remedy of their creditor Hepburn could have
been in any degree affected. Hepburn might have proceeded by
attachment at any time after his debt became due on the first of
April, 1776, except within that short period during which, by the
course of the revolution, the courts of justice were closed; and
which it was declared should not be considered as a part of the
time limited for bringing any action, (w)
But apart from the general principles of law in relation to this
matter, it appears from the docket entries of the late General Court,
that there were several attachments actually laid in the hands of
Mollison's debtors during the war and before the peace of 1783;
and besides, Hepburn's right to proceed by attachment against the
property of the Mollisons here, at the time they were non-resident
alien enemies, has been repeatedly recognized and affirmed in ex-
press terms by the confiscation acts themselves, already noticed, as
well as by those I shall now proceed to consider.
The act of October, 1780, ch. 5, s. 11, is in many respects an
enactment of a very unusual and equivocal character. It autho-
rized debtors of British subjects, such as the Mollisons then were,
upon certain conditions and under certain regulations to pay the
debts so due from them into the treasury. And many debts were
so paid in accordingly. Upon which it afterwards became the
subject of much litigation in the courts of justice, and of long
negotiation between the two nations to determine in what light
those payments were to be considered as between those debtors
and their creditors. It was finally determined, that as between
them, such payments into the treasury were not to be deemed a
satisfaction of those debts in any way. (x) And, in consequence
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(u) Daubigny v. Davallon, 2 Anstr. 463; Albretcht. Sussmann, 2 Ves. & B. 328.—
(w) February, 1777, ch. 15, s. 7.—(x) Dulany v. Wells, 3 H. & McH. 20; The State
of Georgia v. Brailsford, S Dall. 1; Ware v. Hylton, 3 Dall. 199; The Common-
wealth v. Walker, 1 Hen. & Mun, 144; 4 Secret Jour, Cong, 206; 6 Southern
Review, 498.
16 v.3
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