whether legal or merely moral is immaterial, to make restitution of the allotted lands. The taking was in invitum, specifically authorized by law, a valid exertion of the sovereign power of eminent domain. It therefore implied a promise on the part of the Government to pay plaintiffs just compensation. Jacobs v. United States, supra.

The provision of the Act of 1920 invoked by the United States is: "That if it be determined by the Court of Claims in the said suit herein authorized that the United States Government has wrongfully appropriated any lands belonging to the said Indians, damages therefor shall be confined to the value of the said land at the time of said appropriation. . . .” As shown above, the 87,000 acres were taken by valid exertion of the power of eminent domain. The taking was consummated pursuant to the Act of 1906; it was ratified by appropriation and payment under the Act of 1908. It implied a promise to pay just compensation. Clearly the lands in question were not "wrongfully appropriated."

Moreover the Congress by the Act of May 15, 1936 intended to grant to the plaintiffs the right to have their claim for just compensation under the Constitution for the 87,000 acres judicially determined without regard to the settlement and irrespective of the release.1 It spe

14

"A letter of the Secretary of the Interior to the Committee on Indian Affairs on the proposed Act of 1936 said in part: "The bill now here seeks to authorize 'effective judicial determination' of the claim of these Indians for the land taken from their reservation and given to the California & Oregon Land Co., which the courts have plainly indicated to have been for an inadequate consideration." H. Rep. No. 2354, 74th Cong., 2d Sess.

The Report of the House Committee on Indian Affairs stated: "The pending bill to amend the jurisdictional act is limited solely to the object of giving effect to this suggestion of the Supreme Court by granting the Klamath tribes the right to have their claim for

cifically directed the lower court to determine the claim of plaintiffs on the merits and to enter judgment thereon "upon the present pleadings, evidence and findings of fact." Unquestionably the findings of fact are sufficient to sustain the judgment.

Affirmed.

MR. JUSTICE STONE, MR. JUSTICE CARDOZO, and MR. JUSTICE REED took no part in the consideration or decision of this case.

MR. JUSTICE BLACK Concurs in the result.

GUARANTY TRUST CO. v. UNITED STATES.

CERTIORARI TO THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SECOND CIRCUIT.

No. 566. Argued March 28, 29, 1938. Decided April 25, 1938. 1. The rule which exempts the United States and the States from the operation of statutes of limitations rests not upon any inherited notion of royal prerogative but upon the public policy of protecting the public rights, and thereby the citizen, from injury through negligence of public officers. P. 132.

2. The benefit of this rule does not extend to a foreign sovereign suing in a state or federal court. P. 133.

In such cases, the reason for the rule—the considerations of public policy above mentioned-are absent.

just compensation under the Constitution for the taking of the 87,000 acres of their lands judicially determined on its merits without regard to the grossly inequitable settlement heretofore made." H. Rep. No. 2354, 74th Cong., 2nd Sess.

The Report of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs stated: "The purpose of the bill is to enable these Indian tribes to obtain just compensation for the taking of a part of their reservation in the State of Oregon by the Secretary of the Interior under authority of an Act of Congress approved June 21, 1906." S. Rep. No. 1749, 74th Cong., 2nd Sess.

3. The rights of a sovereign State are vested in the State rather than in any particular government which may purport to represent it, and suit in its behalf may be maintained in our courts only by that government which has been recognized by the political department of our own government as the authorized government of the foreign state. P. 136.

4. What government is to be regarded here as representative of a foreign sovereign state is a political rather than a judicial question, and is to be determined by the political department of our government. The action of that department in recognizing a foreign government and in receiving its diplomatic representatives is conclusive on all domestic courts, which are bound to accept that determination, although they are free to decide for themselves its legal consequences in litigations pending before them. P. 137.

5. After the overthrow of the Imperial Russian Government, the United States recognized, March 22, 1917, the Provisional Government of Russia; and thereafter the United States continued to recognize the Provisional Government and to recognize, as its representatives in this country, its Ambassador and the Financial Attaché of its Embassy,-until November 16, 1933, when the Soviet Government, which on November 7, 1917, had overthrown the Provisional Government, was for the first time recognized by the United States. At that same time the United States, through an agreement between the President and a representative of the Soviet Government, took from that government an assignment of all "amounts admitted to be due or that may be found to be due it, as the successor of prior Governments of Russia, or otherwise, from American nationals, including corporations . . ." The United States, as such assignee, then sued in a federal court in New York to recover from a New York bank the amount of a deposit which had stood to the credit of the Provisional Government. The bank set up the New York statute of limitations, claiming that in February, 1918, it had off-set the deposit against indebtedness due it by the Russian Government, and that on that date it had repudiated all liability on the deposit account, and that, prior to June 30, 1922, it had given due notice of such repudiation to both the Financial Attaché and the Ambassador of the Provisional Government, thus starting the running of the limitation period. Held:

(1) That such notice of repudiation, given to the then duly recognized diplomatic representatives, was notice to the Russian State. P. 139.

(2) That the later recognition of the Soviet Government left unaffected those legal consequences of the previous recognition of the Provisional Government and its representatives, which attached to action taken here prior to the later recognition. P. 140.

(3) That if the statutory period has run against the claim of the Russian Government, the claim of the United States, as assignee, is likewise barred since:

(a) Proof that the statutory period had run before the assignment offends against no policy of protecting the domestic sovereign. It deprives the United States of no right, for the proof demonstrates that the United States never acquired a right free of a preëxisting infirmity, the running of limitations against its assignor, which public policy does not forbid. P. 141.

(b) Assuming that the respective rights of the bank and the Soviet Government could have been altered, and the bank's right to plead the statute of limitations curtailed, by force of an executive agreement between the President and the Soviet Government, there is nothing in the agreement and assignment of November 16, 1933, purporting to enlarge the assigned rights in the hands. of the United States, or to free it from the consequences of the failure of the Russian Government to prosecute its claim within the statutory period. P. 142.

(4) Even the language of a treaty will be construed, wherever reasonably possible, so as not to override state laws or to impair rights arising under them. P. 143.

91 F. 2d 898, reversed.

CERTIORARI, 302 U. S. 681, to review the reversal of a judgment dismissing the complaint in an action by the United States to recover from the present petitioner the amount of a bank deposit which the United States claimed as assignee of the Russian Government. The motion was based on the New York statute of limitations.

Mr. John W. Davis, with whom Mr. Ralph M. Carson was on the brief, for petitioner.

Assistant Attorney General Whitaker, with whom Solicitor General Jackson, and Messrs. David E. Hudson, Paul A. Sweeney, and Edward J. Ennis were on the brief, for the United States.

MR. JUSTICE STONE delivered the opinion of the Court.

The principal questions for decision are whether, in a suit at law brought in a federal district court to recover the deposit of a foreign government with a New York bank, such government is subject to the local statute of limitations as are private litigants; and, if so, whether the assignment of November 16, 1933, by the Russian Soviet Government to the United States of the right of the former to the bank account restricts or overrides the operation of the statute of limitations. A subsidiary question is whether in the circumstances of the case the running of the statute of limitations, if otherwise applicable, was affected by our nonrecognition of the Soviet Government during the interval of approximately sixteen years between recognition of the Provisional Government of Russia and recognition of its successor.

On July 15, 1916, the Imperial Russian Government opened a bank account with petitioner, the Guaranty Trust Company, a New York banking corporation. On March 16, 1917, the Imperial Government was overthrown and was succeeded by the Provisional Government of Russia which was recognized by the United States on March 22, 1917. On July 5, 1917, Mr. Boris Bakhmeteff was officially recognized by the President as the Ambassador of Russia. On July 12, 1917, the account being overdrawn, $5,000,000 was deposited in the account by Mr. Serge Ughet, Financial Attache of the Russian Embassy in the United States. On November 7, 1917, the Provisional Government was overthrown and was succeeded by the government of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, which will be referred to as the Soviet Government. At that time there remained on deposit in the account the sum of approximately $5,000,000. On November 28, 1917, the Soviet Government dismissed Bakhmeteff as Ambassador and Ughet as Financial At

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