The Steam-Boat Thomas Jefferson

This is a suit brought in the District Court of Kentucky for subtraction of wages. The libel claims wages earned on a voyage from Shipping-port, in that State, up the river Missouri, and back again to the port of departure; and the. question is, whether this case, as stated in the libel, is of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction, or otherwise within the jurisdiction of the District Court ? The Court below dismissed the libel for want of jurisdiction, and the libellants have appealed from that decree to this Court.

In the great struggles between the Courts of common law and the Admiralty, the…