Sequestration proceedings.
In the Confederate States District Court yesterday, Judge Halyburton presiding, it was ordered, that the following rules be, and they are hereby adopted and established as rules of practice in suits and proceedings under the act of the Congress of the Confederate States of America, approved on the 30th of August, 1861, entitled ‘"An Act for the sequestration of the estates, property, and effects of alien enemies, for the indemnity of citizens of the Confederate States and persons aiding the same in the existing war with the United States."’
- 1st. Two or more persons holding, possessing, or enjoying, jointly or severally, any lands, tenements or hereditaments, goods, chattels, rights or credits, for any alien enemy, or belonging to such alien enemy, may be joined as defendants in the same petition; and the cause may be heard as to any one of said defendants alone, whenever it may seem, to the Court convenient and proper that it should be so heard.
- 2d. Notice of the filing of any petition, and a copy of such petition, and of the interrogatories propounded by the Receiver in any case may be served by delivering a copy of the notice and petition, or of the interrogatories, to the person upon which such notice, and copy of the petition or interrogatories, is to be served; or, if such person be not found at his or her usual place of abode, by delivering such copy, and giving information of its purport, to the wife of such person, or to any white person found there, who is a member of his or her family, and above the age of sixteen years; or, if neither the wife, nor any such white person be found there, by leaving such copy posted at the front door of such place of abode.
- 3d. The notice of the filing of any such petition shall inform the person upon whom it is served, that unless he or she shall appear and file an answer to the petition in Court, (or with the Clerk in his office, if the Court be not in session,) within ten days from the time of the service of such notice, exclusive of the day on which it is served and the day of appearance, and unless the Court shall allow further time to answer, this petition will be taken for confessed, and a final order, or decree, will be made, or judgment entered, or such other order or decree will be made in the cause as the Court may deem proper and the case may require.
- 4th. When lands, or other property of any kind or description, belonging to an alien enemy, or to any other person whose property is declared to be sequestered by said act, shall be deserted, or abandoned by the owner, or shall be found vacant or unoccupied, and not held, or possessed, or controlled, by any one upon whom a notice might be served, a petition may be filed by the Receiver for the District in which such lands or other property may be found, setting forth the facts and circumstances of the case, and praying that such lands or other property may be sequestrated, or such disposition be made of the property as to the Court may seem fit; and the cause shall be docketed and stand for trial according to the usual course of the business of the Court as soon as the petition may be filed; and affidavits, taken without notice, before any Commissioner of this Court, or any Notary Public of this State, or Justice of the Peace of this State, may be read as evidence at the hearing of the cause.
- 5th. When any claim, or demand, may be referred, by order of Court, to a Commissioner to decide upon its validity, or the amount due upon it, and any party interested in such claim or demand shall be dissatisfied with the decision of the Commissioner upon any point of law in relation thereto, he may except to such decision, and require the Commissioner to report such facts, and so much of the testimony as may be necessary to enable the Court to decide upon the exception, and take the opinion of the Court thereon.
