The New Hampshire Gazette

The Astor Case--Decided.--This important trial was decided yesterday morning in favor of the plaintiff. As it has excited a good deal of interest in the public mind, we have prepared the following abstract from the testimony and the arguments of counsel. It appears that in the year 1697, a patent was granted by William the 3d, conveying to Adolph Philipse a large tract of land in the present county of Putnam. He died, leaving the property to Frederick Philipse, by whom it was bequeathed to his children in tail. Mary Philipse, one of his children, intermarried with Roger Morris, who became seized in fee simple of a portion of the estate. During the Revolutionary war, Roger Morris was an active partisan opposed to the struggle for independence; for which reason the state of New-York passed a bill of attainder, by which the property of himself and his wife was confiscated, and thereafter vested in the State, and by the State sold. After the termination of the war, it appeared that in 1758, when the marriage between Roger Morris and Mary Philipse was about to take place, a marriage settlement was made, the legal operation of which was to give to Morris and his wife a life estate in the property, with a contingent remainder to their children--so that the attainder of Morris and his wife attached upon their life estate only, and did not affect the interest of their children.--The claims of the children therefore could not be asserted in a court of justice until the death of both parents, which did not occur until 1825. The present plaintiff, John Jacob Astor, purchased the claim of the children, and upon the death of Mrs. Morris instituted a suit for the recovery of the property. Upon this marriage settlement, the provisions of which vested a legal interest in the children, which no act of the parents could divest them of, the plaintiff grounded his case. The marriage settlement was proved to have been duly executed at the time it bears date, and Judge Thompson decided that the forfeiture of the estate by reason of the attainder of Morris and his wife, attached only to their life estate, and that upon the death of both parents there was no legal impediment to the children's coming into possession of the property.

It is proper to remark, that the present decision does not necessarily determine the final issue of the case in favor of Mr. Astor, since by a compromise between himself and the State Legislature, five of the cases involving the same title are to be prosecuted to final judgment, and if any three of them are decided in favor of the plaintiff, he is to receive from the state the sum of $150,000--subject, however, to a deduction of $200,000, in case it should be decided that he ought not to recover without paying for the buildings and permanent improvements made by the occupiers of the lands. The case now determined is to be taken up to the Supreme Court of the United States by a writ of error.--Journal of Commerce.