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Louisville v. Palmes/Opinion of the Court

The exemption from taxation, created by the eighteenth section of the internal improvement act of 1855, is in every respect similar to that which was declared in Morgan v. Louisiana, 93 U.S. 217, to be not assignable. No words of assignability are used by the legislature of the state in the language creating it, and from its nature and context it is to be inferred that the exemption of the property of the company was intended to be of the same character as that declared in reference to its capital stock and to its officers, servants, and employes, and that all alike were privileges personal to the corporation, or to individuals connected with it, entitled to them by the terms of the law. This exemption, therefore, did not pass from the Alabama & Florida Railroad Company to the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company by the conveyances which passed the title to the railroad itself, and to the franchises connected with and necessary in its construction and operation.

This conclusion is confirmed by the eighteenth section of the act of February 4, 1872, amending the charter of the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company. That section recites that the last-named company having become assignee of the Alabama & Florida Railroad Company, and of its franchises and property, 'which corporation was exempt from taxation for a limited period, the said Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company and its property, now owned or hereafter to be acquired, shall also be exempted from taxation during the remainder of said period.' Here the original exemption is declared to be the privilege of the Florida & Alabama Railroad Company, the particular corporation to which it was granted, and the necessity for conferring it by a new legislative grant upon the assignee of the property and franchises of the original corporation, rests upon the implication that the exemption did not pass to it by the assignment between the parties. And the further inference is equally necessary, that the exemption transferred or created in the new company by the terms of the legislative grant is identical in its character as a personal and unassignable privilege to the new grantee, with that it had when it belonged to the first company.

But the second section of the act of February 27, 1877, incorporating the Pensacola Railroad Company, authorized and empowered it to acquire by purchase and assignment all the property, rights, franchises, privileges, and immunities of the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company, and, upon completion of such purchase and assignment, declared that the former should be deemed, in law and in equity, to be fully invested with and entitled to all the said property, rights, franchises, privileges, and immunities as though the same were originally granted to or acquired by the said Pensacola Railroad Company.

It is claimed that this language is broad enough to cover the assignment and transfer of the immunity from taxation granted to the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company by the eighteenth section of its charter. And we are of this opinion. The language is comprehensive and unequivocal, and the word 'immunity' is apt to describe the exemption claimed. It admits of no doubt, we think, if the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company were entitled to this exemption, and if the legislative grant of authority to make and accept this assignment of it was valid and effective, that the right to be exempt from taxation according to its terms passed to the Pensacola Railroad Company. But it must be borne in mind that it must be taken to have vested in the latter, if at all, precisely as it had in the former; that is, as a personal privilege. The assignment in the particular instance, based upon the express authority of a new enactment, did not impart to the immunity the quality of general assignability to other successors in the title to the property and franchises, claiming only under a conveyance between the parties.

The title of the plaintiff in error, therefore, to the exemption claimed, must be supported by some other authority. This is claimed to be found in the general power given by the thirteenth section of its charter to the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company to lease or sell to or consolidate with any other railroad company in or out of the state, which power passed with others to the Pensacola Railroad Company by the second section of its charter. But as we have already seen, and as was decided in Morgan v. Louisiana, 93 U.S. 217, and Wilson v. Gaines, 103 U.S. 417, the exemption from taxation does not pass by virtue of a conveyance of the railroad and its franchises, which was all the Pensacola Railroad Company could pass under that authority, but requires for its transfer some particular and express description, indicating unequivocally the intention of the legislature that it might pass by an assignment. That does not exist in this case, and the exemption claimed by the plaintiff in error fails because it was not and could not be transferred to it, under the law, by the Pensacola Railroad Company.

It is sought to avoid this conclusion by converting the question into one of pleading. It is said that the bill alleges, as a matter of fact, that the exemption passed to and vested in the complaintant below, and that the truth of the allegation is admitted by the demurrer. But this is matter of law; the documents of title are exhibited with the bill and constitute part of the record; and we take judicial notice of their legal effect. A fact impossible in law cannot be admitted by a demurrer. In Wilson v. Gaines, 103 U.S. 417, it was inferred, in the face of a demurrer, claimed to be an admission of a contrary allegation, that the sale did not pass any rights of property, not described, as within the lien of the mortgage.

We have thus shown that the claim of the plaintiff in error to the exemption alleged fails, because the Pensacola Railroad Company, if it possessed it, had no power to convey it. It will appear, on further examination, that it fails for a distinct and deeper reason, namely, because the Pensacola Railroad Company was itself not entitled to any such exemption. That company was incorporated by the act of February 27, 1877, which undoubtedly did purport to grant to it, as assignee of the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company, in terms sufficiently broad, the immunity from taxation which, by the eighteenth section of the act of February 4, 1872, was expressly declared to be granted to the latter. Both the statutes, however, were passed by the general assembly of Florida, acting under the constitution of that state, which went into effect in 1868. Article 12, § 1, of that constitution is as follows:

'The legislature shall provide for a uniform and equal rate     of taxation, and shall prescribe such regulations as shall      secure a just valuation of all property, both real and      personal, excepting such property as may be exempted by law      for municipal, educational, literary, scientific, religious,      or charitable purposes.'

'The property of all corporations, whether heretofore or     hereafter incorporated, shall be subject to taxation, unless      such corporation be for religious, educational, or charitable      purposes.' In 1875 this clause was amended so as to read as follows:

'The property of all corporations, whether heretofore or     hereafter incorporated, shall be subject to taxation, unless      such property be held and used exclusively for religious,      educational, or charitable purposes.'

It is under the authority and in pursuance of the mandates of these constitutional provisions that the legislature passed the act of March 5, 1881, under which the road of the plaintiff in error is subjected to taxation, and the validity of which is here under review.

It cannot be and is not contended that under these constitutional limitations the legislature of Florida could make an original grant to a railroad corporation exempting its railroad property from taxation. But the grant to the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company by the act of 1872, and that to the Pensacola Railroad Company by the act of 1877, though in form the renewal or transfers of previously existing grants, were in fact the creation of new ones. In Trask v. Maguire, 18 Wall 391-409, it was said, speaking of similar provisions in the constitution of Missouri: 'The inhibition of the constitution applies in all its force against the renewal of an exemption equally as against its original creation;' and in Shields v. Ohio, 95 U.S. 319, it was decided that in cases of corporations created by consolidation the powers of the new company did not pass to it by transmission from its constituents, but resulted from a new legislative grant, that could not transcend the constitutional authority existing at the time it took effect. It follows that the exemption from taxation in terms contained in the charters of 1872 and 1877 were void, as unauthorized and prohibited by the state constitution of 1868.

It does not weaken this conclusion to say that the exemption contained in the internal improvement act of 1855 was authorized by the constitution of the state then in force, which may be admitted, and that it was assignable in its nature or by its terms in such manner that it became impressed upon the property itself into whosesoever hands it should afterwards come, following the title, like an easement or a covenant running with the land, which we have shown, however, not to be the case; for, even on that supposition, the privilege is one that must be exercised by some person capable in law of accepting and exercising it. The conception of an immunity that is impressed upon the thing in respect to which it is granted is purely metaphorical. The grant is to a person in respect of a thing, and it is said to inhere in or be attached to the thing only when by its terms the grant is assignable by a conveyance of the thing, and passess as an incident with the title to each successor. There must always be a person capable not only of receiving the title, but also of accepting the conditions accompanying it, and which constitute the exemption; otherwise the conditions become impossible and void.

After the adoption of the constition of Florida of 1868, there could be no corporation created capable in law of accepting and enjoying such an exemption, for that was prohibited by the constitutional provisions that have been cited. In the case of the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company, in 1872, the capacity at that time to receive this privilege depended altogether upon the legislative act amending its charter to that effect; and if any doubt as to this might be reasonably entertained, certainly none can arise as to the Pensacola Railroad Company, which derived all its powers and its very existence from legislation dependent for its validity wholly upon the constitution of 1868. The prohibition which forbids the legislature from exempting the property of railroad corporations from taxation, makes it impossible for the legislature to create such a corporation capable in law of acquiring and holding property free from liability to taxation.

It has, however, been earnestly urged upon us in argument, by counsel for the plaintiff in error, that the supreme court of Florida, in the case of Gonzales v. Sullivan, 16 Fla. 791, explicitly decided, in opposition to the views we have expressed, that the railroad and property, the subject of this litigation, then held by the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company, were exempt from taxation, according to the terms of the provision in the internal improvement act of 1858; and it is pressed upon us as a conclusive determination of the law of Florida upon the point, particularly authoritative in the present case, for the reason that the plaintiff in error, having, subsequently to that decision, acquired its title, may be presumed to have acted upon the faith of it.

This presumption is not pressed, however, to the extent of establishing a contract between the plaintiff in error and the state of Florida, the obligation of which has been impaired by any law subsequently passed, nor of working an estoppel against the state as res adjudicata, with an equivalent effect. The decision cited, therefore, cannot be allowed any greater effect as an authority than ought to be given, in cases of this description, to the judgments of state tribunals.

The question we have to consider and decide is whether, in the judgment under review, the supreme court of Florida gave effect to a law of the state which, in violation of the constitution of the United States, impairs the obligation of a contract. In reaching a conclusion on that point, we decide for ourselves, independently of the decision of the state court, whether there is a contract, and whether its obligation is impaired; and if the decision of the question as to the existence of the alleged contract requires a construction of state constitutions and laws, we are not necessarily governed by previous decisions of the state courts upon the same or similar points, except where they have been so firmly established as to constitute a rule of property. Such has been the uniform and well-settled doctrine of this court. State Bank of Ohio v. Knoop, 16 How. 369-391.

As was said by Chief Justice TANEY in the case of ''Ohio Life Ins. & Trust Co. v. Debolt'', 16 How. 416-432:

'But this rule of interpretation is confined to ordinary acts     of legislation, and does not extend to the contracts of the      state, although they should be made in the form of a law; for      it would be impossible for this court to exercise any      appellate power in a case of this kind, unless it was at      liberty to interpret for itself the instrument relied on as      the contract between the parties. It must necessarily decide     whether the words used are words of contract, and what is      their true meaning, before it can determine whether the      obligation the instrument created has or has not been impaired by the law complained of. Now, in forming     its judgment upon this subject, it can make no difference      whether the instrument claimed to be a contract is in the      form of a law, passed by the legislature, or of a covenant or      agreement by one of its agents acting under the authority of      the state.'

To the same effect are the cases of Jefferson Branch Bank v. Skelly, 1 Black, 436, and Bridge Proprietors v. Hoboken Co. 1 Wall. 116.

It is true that in all these cases the state courts, whose judgments were brought into review, had construed the statutes as not creating a contract; but the principle is equally applicable in the converse case. Burgess v. Seligman, 107 U.S. 20; [S.C.. 2 SUP. CT. REP. 10.]

It is undoubtedly true that the opinion of the supreme court of Florida, in the case of Gonzales v. Sullivan, 16 Fla. 791, is not consistent with that which we have expressed upon some of the principal questions involved in this case. It did declare, speaking of the effect of the internal improvement act of 1855, 'that an exemption from taxation resting in contract is annexed, by the terms of the law which created it, to the road itself, and not to the companies,' and that by the act of 1872 the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company, as assignee of the Florida & Alabama Railroad, became entitled to the exemption, because 'the property passed, and with it, as an incident, went the exemption.' But the main topics in the discussion in the opinion were, whether the Florida & Alabama Railroad was within the scope of the internal improvement act of January 6, 1855, by virtue of the amendment of December 14, 1855, the constitutional authority to pass which was denied in argument, but affirmed by the court; and the question as to the effect of the provisions of the constitution of 1868, which we have considered, upon the capacity of the Pensacola & Louisville Railroad Company and the Pensacola Railroad Company to accept the privilege and benefit of the exemption, by legislative authority exerted in 1872 and 1877, does not seem to have been raised or noticed, much less adjudged.

In our opinion there is no error in the judgment of the supreme court of Florida in the matter complained of, and it is accordingly affirmed.


text: Talk:Louisville v. Palmes/Opinion of the Court

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text:
United States v. Walker (109 U.S. 258)

The declaration contained two counts. The first count set out the obligation of the bond without stating the condition. The second count stated the obligation of the bond and averred the condition as above set forth, and assigned as breach the failure of Charlotte L. Ames to pay over to Wilson, the administrator de bonis non, the said sum of $34,876.75.

The defendant pleaded to the first count the condition of the bond and its performance. To the second count he pleaded, first, 'that by the condition of the bond the defendant, as surety, became liable to the plaintiff, as administrator de bonis non, only for such of the assets of the estate as had not been converted into money by the said administrators or the survivor, and the defendant says that the assets of said estate consisted wholly of a claim or chose in action owing by the government of the United States, and that the money claimed in this action is the proceeds of said claim or chose in action collected from the government, and thereby converted into money,' etc. The second plea to the second count averred that the defendant, as surety as aforesaid, was liable only for such assets of said estate as had not been administered by said administrators or the survivor, and that the money claimed in this action is for assets which had been administered before the removal of said surviving administrator from office, and the appointment of plaintiff. Both these pleas also aver that defendant was not a party to the proceeding in which the order to pay over was made and was served with process therein, nor did he voluntarily appear.

In his replication to the first plea (the plea of condition performed) the plaintiff set out three breaches, each of them consisting in the failure of the administratrix to pay over the money to her successor in compliance with an order of the court. The plaintiff demurred to the remaining pleas. The defendant demurred to the replication to the first plea. Issue was joined on both demurrers, and the court, in general term, overruled the plaintiff's demurrer, sustained that filed by the defendant, and entered judgment for the defendant. The plaintiff thereupon sued out this writ of error.

A. S. Worthington, for plaintiff in error.

W. D. Davidge, for defendant in error.

WOODS, J.

title: United States v. Walker (109 U.S. 258)


text: Talk:United States v. Walker (109 U.S. 258)


text:
United States v. Walker (109 U.S. 258)/Opinion of the Court

The first question presented by the record is whether it was competent for the administrator de bonis non of the estate of Ames to sue on the bond of the principal administrator to recover money collected by him from the United States and not paid over or accounted for. It is well settled at common law that 'the title of an administrator de bonis non extends only to the goods and personal estate, such as leases for years, household goods, etc., which remain in specie and were not administered by the first executor or administrator, as also to all debts due and owing to the testator or intestate.' Bac. Abr. tit. 'Executors and Administrators, B 2, 2;' citing Packman's Case, 6 Coke, 19.

In illustration of this rule the same authority says:

'It is holden that if an executor receives money in right of the testator, and lays it up by itself and dies intestate,     that this money shall go to the administrator de bonis non,      being as easily distinguished as part of the testator's      effects, as goods in specie. But if A. dies intestate, and     his son takes out administration to him and receives part of      a debt, being rent arrear to the intestate, and accepts a      promissory note for the residue, and then dies intestate,      this acceptance of the note is such an alteration of the      property as vests it in the son; and therefore, on his death,      it shall go to his administrator, and not to the      administrator de bonis non.'

An administrator de bonis non derives his title from the deceased, and not from the former executor or administrator. To him is committed only the administration of the goods, chattels, and credits of the deceased which have not been administered. He is entitled to all the goods and personal estate which remain in specie. Money received by thf former executor or administrator, in his character as such, and kept by itself, will be so regarded; but if mixed with the administrator's own money, it is considered as connected, or as, technically speaking, 'administered.' Beall v. New Mexico, 16 Wall. 535; Wernick's Adm'r v. McMurdo, 5 Rand. 51; Bank of Penn. v. Haldeman, 1 Pen. & W. 161; Kendall v. Lee and Potts v. Smith, 3 Rawle, 361; Bell v. Speight, 11 Humph. 451; Swink's Adm'r v. Snodgrass, 17 Ala. 653; Slaughter v. Froman, 5 T. B. Mon. 19; Gamble v. Hamilton, 7 Mo. 469; Wiggin v. Swett, 6 Metc. 194; State v. Johnson, 7 Blackf. 529.

In the case of Beall v. New Mexico, supra, it was said by Mr. Justice BRADLEY, speaking for this court, that 'by the English law, as administered by the ecclesiastical courts, the administrator who is displaced, or the representative of a deceased administrator or executor intestate, are required to account directly to the persons beneficially interested in the estate,-distributees, next of kin, or creditors,-and the accounting may be made or enforced in the probate court, which is the proper court to supervise the conduct of administrators and executors. To the administrator de bonis non is committed only the administration of the goods, chattels, and credits of the deceased which have not been administered.' Such was the law of Maryland before the organization of the District to be in the district, unless changed by statute. In the case of Hagthorp v. Hook's Adm'rs, 1 Gill & J. 270, it was held by the court of appeals of Maryland that the authority conferred by the letters of administration de bonis non, issued under the act of 1798, No. 101, c. 14, § 2, was 'to administer all things described in the act of assembly as assets not converted into money, and not distributed, delivered, or retained by the former executor or administrator under the direction of the orphans' court. Such an administrator can only sue for those goods, chattels, and credits which his letters authorize him to administer.'

To the same effect are the cases of Sibley v. Williams, 3 Gill & J. 52; Hagthorp v. Neale, 7 Gill & J. 13; and Lemmon v. Hall, 20 Md. 171.

In the case of Ennis v. Smith, 14 How. 400, it was said by this court:

'We understand by the laws of Maryland, ad they stood when     congress assumed jurisdiction over the District of Columbia,      that the property of a deceased person was considered to be      administered whenever it was sold or converted into money by      the administrator or executor, or in any respect changed from      the condition in which the deceased left it. It did not go to     the administrator de bonis non unless, on the death of the      executor or administrator, it remained in specie or was the      same then that it had been when it came to his hands. When     the assets have been changed, it is said in Maryland that      they have been administered.'

But counsel for appellant contend that this rule applies only to the case where an executor or administrator has died, and not to the case where he had been removed; that while the words 'not administered,' in the commission of an administrator de bonis non, still frequently mean not changed in form, yet, as applied to an administrator de bonis non in place of a living administrator, they have come to mean almost invariably not fully and legally administered, and it is said that this distinction appears in the laws of Maryland in force before the organization of the District of Columbia, and continuing in force until the passage of the act of February 20, 1846, 'to enlarge the powers of the several orphans' courts held in and for the District of Columbia.' 9 St. 4.

In support of this view we are referred to chapter 101 of the Maryland act of 1798, (2 Kilty, Laws,) by which it is provided, in subchapter 5, § 5, that where letters testamentary have been granted in a case of the discovery of a will, and consequent revocation of letters of administration, it shall be the duty of the administrators to file their accounts and 'to deliver to the executor, on demand, all the goods, chattels, and personal estate in their possession belonging to the deceased,' and on failure their administration bonds shall be liable to be put in suit; and to subchapter 6, § 13, of the same statute, where it is provided that if an executor or administor shall not file his inventory within 30 days, his letters may be revoked and other letters granted, and thereupon the power of such executor or administrator shall cease, and he shall deliver up to the person obtaining such letters all the property of the deceased in his hands.

These statutes do not tend to support the distinction relied on by plaintiff in error, for, it is well established by the authorities we have cited, that the goods and chattels, personal estate, and property of the deceased are such only as remain unchanged and in specie. When a debt due the deceased is collected, or a chattel of his estate is sold, the money received becomes the property of the administrator, and he is accountable therefor to those beneficially interested in the estate, and, under the acts referred to, the removed executor or administrator was not bound to turn it over to his successor.

It may be conceded that the words 'unadministered assets,' as used in statutes, have sometimes been construed to include the proceeds of assets sold or collected and not accounted for or paid over; and that an administrator de bonis non might call a removed administrator to account for such proceeds. But whatever may have been the rule elsewhere upon this question, we think that the provisions of the act of congress of February 20, 1846, to enlarge the power of the several orphans' courts held in and for the District of Columbia, (9 St. 4,) reproduced in sections 975, 976, 977, 978 of the Revised Statutes relating to the District of Columbia, the common law is not changed, and that the statute applies the same rule to the case of a removed, as has been applied to the case of a deceased, executor or administrator.

Section 974 provides that if the security on the bond of an executor or administrator shall become, for any cause, insufficient, the court may order him to give further security. Section 975 provides that if he fails to comply with such order the court may remove him and appoint a new administrator.

'The court shall further have power to order and require any     assets or estate of the decedent which may remain      unadministered to be delivered to the newly-appointed      administrator de bonis non, and to enforce a compliance with      such order by fine and attachment, or any other legal      process.'

We think the meaning of this act is plain. When it was passed the words 'assets or estate of the decedent which remain unadministered,' had a uniform and well-settled meaning in the statute law of Maryland, in force in the District of Columbia, and that meaning, as we have seen, was assets or estate remaining in specie and unchanged in form. The act of 1846 must be construed as using the words in this well-settled signification unless the contrary appears. But there is not a word in the act of 1846 to indicate that congress intended to give any new or different meaning to these words. Independently of this consideration the meaning of the law is not doubtful. It would be an unnatural construction to say that the law required the removed executor or administrator to deliver to his successor assets which had been converted or wasted and which no longer existed, and when there remained only a right to sue for their value. When assets have been turned into money by an executor or administrator, and the money mingled with his own, the assets have ceased to exist as assets or estate of the decedent.

It is the assets and estate of the decedent that are to be delivered. The authorities we have referred to all concur in the proposition that where personal property of an estate under administration has been sold or a debt collected, the proceeds are not property of the decedent, but are the individual property of the executor or administrator, and he is liable to an action for not accounting. When assets have been turned into money by an executor or administrator he is bound to account, not for the identical money received, but for an equal amount, and if he fails to account for and pay over this equal amount he is liable in damages, which are measured by the proceeds of the assets so turned into money. The statute surely cannot mean that the removed administrator must 'deliver' damages to his successor.

Our conclusion is therefore that the act of February 20, 1846, does not apply a different rule to the case of an administrator de bonis non succeeding a removed administrator from that applied to one succeeding a deceased administrator, and that no action lies on the bond sued on in this case in favor of the administrator de bonis non to recover money collected by Mrs. Ames from the United States on a claim belonging to the estate of the decedent. On the contrary, the defendant as surety on the bond of the removed administrator is liable only at the suit of creditors, distributees and legatees entitled to the funds.

The next point taken by the plaintiff in error, that the decree of the justice of the supreme court of the district directing the administratrix to pay over the fund to her successor, was conclusive in this suit. We are of opinion that, in making the order referred to, the supreme court of the district exceeded its jurisdiction, and that its order is for that reason void. Its authority, and its sole authority for making the order, is to be found in section 976, above referred to, of the Revised Statutes relating to the District of Columbia: 'The court shall have further power to order and require any assets or estate of the decedent which may remain unadministered to be delivered to the newly-appointed administrator de bonis non.' It appears from the pleadings in the case that the money ordered to be paid was the proceeds of a debt due the decedent which his administratrix had collected. It was not, therefore, as we have seen, assets or estate of the decedent. It was the property of the removed administrator. The court was therefore without power to direct the payment of the money to the administrator de bonis non. Although a court may have jurisdiction over the parties and the subject-matter, yet if it makes a decree which is not within the powers granted to it by the law of its organization its decree is void. The limitation was well expressed by Mr. Justice SWAYNE in Cornett v. Williams, 20 Wall. 226, when he said: 'The jurisdiction having attached in this case, everything done within the power of that jurisdiction when collaterally questioned is held conclusive of the rights of the parties unless impeached for fraud.'

The case of Bigelow v. Forrest, 9 Wall. 339, is in point. It was an action of ejectment. Bigelow, who was defendant in the court below, relied for title on a sale made under a decree of the United States district court rendered in a proceeding for the confiscation of the premises sued for under the act of July 17, 1862. Referring to this decree, Mr. Justice STRONG, speaking for this court, said: 'Doubtless a decree of a court having jurisdiction to make the decree cannot be collaterally impeached, but under the act of congress the district court had no power to order a sale which should confer on the purchaser rights outlasting the life of French Forrest.' And the judgment of the court was, that so much of the decree of the district court as was in excess of its powers was void.

In Ex parte Lange, 18 Wall 163, Mr. Justice MILLER, delivering the opinion of the court, after stating that the circuit court had exceeded its authority in pronouncing sentence upon Lange, and that its judgment was therefore void, said:

'It is no answer to this to say that the court had     jurisdiction of the person of the prisoner and of the offense      under the statute. It by no means follows that these two     facts make valid, however erroneous it may be, any judgment      the court may render in such case.'

In the case of Windsor v. McVeigh, 93 U.S. 274, Mr. Justice FIELD, after a review of the cases bearing upon this subject, announces their result as follows:

'The doctrine invoked by counsel, that when a court has once     acquired jurisdiction it has a right to decide every question      which arises in the case, and its judgment, however      erroneous, cannot be collaterally assailed, is undoubtedly      correct as a general proposition, but is subject to many      qualifications in its application. It is only correct when     the court proceeds, after acquiring jurisdiction of the      cause, according to established modes governing the class to      which the case belongs, and does not transcend in the extent      or character of its judgment the law which is applicable to      it.'

In this case the statute gave the court power, on the removal of an executor or administrator, to order the assets of the decedent, which might remain unadministered, to be delivered to the administrator de bonis non. The court made an order directing the delivery of the proceeds of administered assets. This was beyond the power conferred by the statute, and not within the jurisdiction of the court The order was therefore void.

The result of these views is, that the judgment of the supreme court of the District of Columbia was right, and must be affirmed.


text: Talk:United States v. Walker (109 U.S. 258)/Opinion of the Court


text:
Meath v. Board of Mississippi Levee Comissioners

The plaintiff claimed in the present action the sum of $70,000, as due him for work done and accepted under said contract, and a large sum for damages, because he was not permitted to complete the work. The defendant filed eight pleas, but as the judgment of the court below was based exclusively on the sixth and seventh pleas, the others need not be noticed. The sixth plea averred that 'the several supposed causes of action in said declaration mentioned, if any such there were or still are, did not, nor did any or either of them, accrue to the said plaintiff at any time within seven years next preceding the commencement of this suit.' The seventh plea set out the facts in regard to such former suit, begun March 26, 1877, referred to in the declaration, denied that it was decided against the plaintiff for matter of form only, and averred that it was so decided on matter of substance; and concluded by averring that 'the present action was not brought within seven years after the cause of action accrued,' and was, therefore, barred by the statute. The plaintiff demurred to these pleas, and his demurrer was overruled. Thereupon he filed his replication, taking issue. The parties waived a jury, and submitted the issues of fact to the court by the following agreement:

'In this cause a jury is waived, and it is agreed to submit the cause to the court in lieu of a jury, to be decided on the law and the evidence, and separate findings thereof to be rendered by the court, so that the decision may be finally reviewed by the supreme court of the United States. The court having, in the decision of the questions arising upon the demurrers to sixth and seventh pleas filed, expressed the opinion that the pending of the former suit could not be availed of to prevent the bar of the statute of limitations, and that this action is barred by limitation, it is agreed that that sole question shall be presented upon the pleadings and proof, and that only such evidence as in the judgment of the court bears upon that issue shall be incorporated in its findings and presented to the supreme court of the United States; and that the record for said court shall consist of the pleadings and exhibits, the orders of the court, the findings of fact and law in the cause, and this agreement. And it is further agreed that should the supreme court differ in opinion with and reverse the circuit court the cause shall be remanded for trial on its merits on all the other questions in the case.'

The cause was tried under this agreement, and the court made both a general and special finding of facts. The general finding was as follows:

'The court having heard the evidence upon the sixth and seventh pleas of the defendant, and replications thereto, etc., finds said issues in favor of defendants, and that said plaintiff's right of action when this suit was brought was barred by the statute of limitations.'

The court found, by its special findings, as follows: The plaintiff's cause of action accrued in this case on April 1, 1871, and, what the record also shows, this action was brought December 21, 1878; on March 26, 1877, the plaintiff brought an action against the defendant on the contract set out in and exhibited with the declaration in this cause; the defendant pleaded a transfer of all interest in said contract to an assignee in bankruptcy, under the bankrupt law; to said plea the plaintiff replied that his assignee in bankruptcy had sold the said contract to one Boyle, who purchased it for the plaintiff, and assigned it to him on the ___ day of January, 1877; issue was joined to this replication; this issue was submitted to the court for trial; on the trial it was shown that the assignment by Boyle to Meath was made on January 28, 1878; on this state of facts the court found that the plaintiff did not have the legal title to the claim sued on when the action was commenced; and judgment therein was rendered in that suit for the defendants.

Upon the general and special findings, the court found, as matter of law, that this action was barred by the limitation of seven years, and rendered judgment for the defendants. To this conclusion of law the plaintiff excepted and sued out the present writ of error.

S. P. Walker, for plaintiff in error.

James Lowndes, for defendant in error.

WOODS, J.


text: Talk:Meath v. Board of Mississippi Levee Comissioners


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Meath v. Board of Mississippi Levee Comissioners/Opinion of the Court

It is insisted by the plaintiff in error that the special findings of the court are fatally defective, because they do not find the contract by which the suit was brought, or fix the date when the cause of action accrued, and that for this reason the judgment of the circuit court should be reversed. We might dismiss this assignment of error on the ground that there was a general finding for defendants on all the issues of fact, and that no error can be assigned on such a finding. Tioga R. R. v. Blossburg & C. R. R. 20 Wall. 137. But the special findings also fix specifically the date when the plaintiff's right of action accrued, to-wit, on the first day of April, 1871. In considering the sufficiency of the special findings the stipulation between counsel for submitting the cause to the court must be kept in mind. The only questions which, by this agreement, were to be submitted to the court were the issues raised by the replication to the sixth and seventh pleas, being pleas of the statute of limitations. The contract and breaches as set out in the declaration were, for the purpose of this trial, taken for granted. They were confessed by the pleas, and, as a matter of avoidance, the statute of limitations was set up. The court, by its general and special findings, has declared, as a conclusion of fact, that the matters set up in the pleas of the statute of limitations were proven. We think the findings pass upon every issue submitted to the court, and that they are not imperfect or defective.

The limitation law of Mississippi applicable to this case was as follows:

'Art. 6. All actions of debt or covenant founded upon any     bond, obligation or contract, under seal or upon the award of      arbitrators, shall be commenced within seven years next after      the cause of such action accrned, and not after.'

The Revised Code of Mississippi of 1871, failed to provide any limitation for causes of action under seal which arose after October 1, 1871, the date fixed by section 2938, when that Code should take effect, but did contain the following provision:

'Sec. 2172. The several periods of limitation prescribed by     this chapter shall commence from the date when it shall take      effect, but the same shall not apply to any action commenced,      nor to any cases where the right of action or of entry shall      have accrued before that time, but the same shall be subject      to the laws now in force; but this law may be pleaded in any      case where a bar has accrued under the provisions thereof.'

It will appear from these provisions of the statute law that the absence of any limitation of actions upon contracts under seal, between October 1, 1873, and April 19, 1873, can have no effect upon the controversy in this case. When the cause of action in this case arose, as found by the court, to-wit, on April 1, 1871, article 6, p. 400, of the Code of 1857, above quoted, barring actions on sealed instruments in seven years, was in force, and this limitation was expressly continued by the Revised Code of 1871.

The case of Furlong v. State, 58 Miss. 717, relied on by counsel for plaintiff in error, can have no application to the case, for in that suit the cause of action accrued after the Code of 1871 had taken effect. Nothing was decided in that case which has any bearing on this. Therefore, upon the facts specially found, namely, that the cause of action in this case accrued on April 1, 1871, and that this suit was not brought until December 21, 1878, it is apparent that the sixth plea of defendant is sustained, unless this case is saved by the averment in the declaration that the suit was brought within a year after a former suit for the same cause of action had been defeated for matter of form. It is, therefore, to be considered whether, upon the special findings, the plaintiff is entitled to the saving clause of section 2163 of the Code of 1871, which is as follows:

'If, in any action duly commenced within the time allowed,     the writ shall be abated or the action otherwise avoided or      defeated by the death or marriage of any party thereto, or      for any matter of form, *  *  * the plaintiff may commence a      new action for the same cause at any time within one year      after the abatement or other determination of the original      suit.'

The findings show that on March 26, 1877, an action, in all respects similar to this, was brought, on the same contract sued on in this case, by the plaintiff in error against the same defendants, and that, upon the trial of that suit, the court found that the plaintiff did not have a legal title to the claim sued on when the said action was commenced, and judgment was accordingly rendered in favor of the defendant and against the plaintiff. Upon these findings the circuit court was of opinion in this case that the former action was not defeated for any matter of form, and therefore that the plaintiff's cause did not fall within the exception of section 2173 of the Code of 1871, and was barred by the limitation of seven years applicable to contracts under seal. We are of opinion that the facts thus specially found sustain the judgment of the circuit court in this case. The supreme court of Mississippi, in the case of M. & C. R. Co. v. Orr, 43 Miss. 279, has construed the phrase 'for matter of form,' in section 2163, and declared that it 'relates to technical defects in the form of the action or pleadings or proof, or to variances between the one and the other.'

This case it is evident does not fall within this rule. The action brought by plaintiff on March 26, 1877, was defeated because it appeared from the proof that when it was brought the plaintiff had no cause of action. The issue was deliberately and squarely presented by the pleadings in that former suit whether at the time of its commencement the right of action was in the plaintiff. The defendant averred it to be in the plaintiff's assignee in bankruptcy. The plaintiff replied that the contract on which his action was based had been bought at the assignee's sale and assigned to Thomas Boyle, who, before the commencement of the action, to-wit, in January, 1877, had assigned and transferred it to him. On this the defendant took issue, and on that issue the cause was tried. Upon the trial it turned out that the assignment by Boyle to the plaintiff was not made until January 28, 1878, more than 10 months after the action was brought, and the finding and judgment on the issue submitted was against the plaintiff and for the defendant.

Upon this state of facts we think the former suit was defeated, not for any matter of form, but for matter of substance. The plaintiff failed in his action because the legal title to the contract on which he brought his suit was in another, because the evidence did not sustain the issue upon which he had staked his cause. The present case, therefore, does not fall within the exception prescribed by section 2137 of the Code of Mississippi of 1871, and is barred by the limitation of seven years prescribed by the Code of 1851, applicable to contracts under seal.

It follows that the judgment of the circuit court was right, and must be affirmed.


text: Talk:Meath v. Board of Mississippi Levee Comissioners/Opinion of the Court


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Monongahela National Bank of Brownsville v. Jacobus

D. T. Watson, for plaintiff in error.

''Thos. C. Lazear and W. W. Douglass'', for defendant in error.

HARLAN, J.


text: Talk:Monongahela National Bank of Brownsville v. Jacobus


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Monongahela National Bank of Brownsville v. Jacobus/Opinion of the Court

The plaintiff in error having recovered a judgment for $9,056.12 against Alfred Patterson, in the circuit court of the United States for the western district of Pennsylvania, caused an execution attachment to be issued against the Fayette County Railroad Company and Samuel H. Jacobus, the defendant in error, attaching as the property of Patterson certain shares of the capital stock of that company which stood in the name of Jacobus. The attachment was duly served upon Patterson, Jacobus, and the railroad company. The controlling issue in the case is whether the stock was the property of Alfred Patterson and liable to be attached in satisfaction of the judgment against him. Jacobus claims that the stock became his property in virtue of an unrecorded assignment and transfer for a valuable consideration by Alfred Patterson prior to the rendition of that judgment; consequently, that it is not liable to the bank's attachment. In the progress of the litigation Patterson died, and his administrator was substituted of record as a party defendant. The contention on the part of the bank is that the assignment was by an insolvent debtor in trust for certain preferred creditors, and that it must have been recorded in order to protect the stock from the attachment of judgment creditors; that of Jacobus is that the assignment was made in consideration of his assumption of certain liabilities of the debtor, and without any intent upon the part of either himself or Patterson to hinder, delay, or defraud the creditors of the latter. At the trial, Jacobus, a witness in his own behalf, was allowed, over the objections of plaintiff, to testify as to what took place between him and Patterson at the time the stock in question was assigned by the latter to the former. The administrator was also permitted, over the objection of the plaintiff, to prove-he being present on the occasion of the assignment-that the assumption by Jacobus of certain debts of Patterson's was in consideration and on the faith of the transfer of this stock. This testimony bore directly upon the controlling issue in the case between the bank and Jacobus.

Whether Jacobus and the administrator of Patterson were competent witnesses depends upon the construction of section 858 of the Revised Statutes, which provides that 'in the courts of the United States no witness shall be excluded in any action on account of color, or in any civil action because he is a party to or interested in the issue tried: provided, that in actions by or against executors, administrators, or guardians, in which judgment may be rendered for or against them, neither party shall be allowed to testify against the other as to any transaction with or statement by the testator, intestate, or ward, unless called to testify thereto by the opposite party, or required to testify thereto by the court.'In Potter v. ''Nat. Bank'', 102 U.S. 163, we held that in actions in which judgment may be rendered for or against an executor, administrator, or guardian, it is no objection to the competency of the witness that he is interested in the issue to be tried, because, in such cases, the statute excluded only parties to the record; that is, those who, according to the established rules of pleading and evidence, are parties to the issue. It is now argued by plaintiff in error that Jacobus, as well as the administrator of Alfred Patterson, are parties to the record, and, unless called by the court or the opposite party, are incompetent to testify as to any transactions or statements by the intestate. We are of opinion that they were each competent as a witness on the issue between the bank and Jacobus, as to whether these shares of stock were the property of the latter, and subject to the former's attachment. The liability of Alfred Patterson to the bank had become fixed by the judgment against him for the debt. There can be no judgment against his estate, in this action, by which the amount of the bank's claim can be increased, or whereby Patterson's estate can be released from liability in whole or in part. The real issue was between the bank and Jacobus, and consequently the case is within the first clause of section 858, which provides that 'no witness shall be excluded * *  * in any civil action because he is a party to or interested in the issue tried.' Within the meaning and object of the proviso, this is not an action by or against an administrator, on which judgment may be rendered for or against him. We are of opinion that there was no error in admitting Jacobus or the administrator of Patterson to testify on their own motion.

In reference to the merits of the case, we no dot perceive that any error was committed by the circuit court. The jury were properly instructed as to the law of the case. The judgment is affirmed.


text: Talk:Monongahela National Bank of Brownsville v. Jacobus/Opinion of the Court


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Grace v. American Centural Insurance Company of St. Louis

This is an action upon a policy of fire insurance issued September 26, 1877, by the American Central Insurance Company of St. Louis to the firm of William R. Grace & Co. The circumstances under which it was issued are these: A clerk of William R. Grace & Co., charged with the duty of effecting insurance against loss by fire upon their property, employed one W. R. Moyes, a broker in the city of New York, to obtain insurance, in a specified amount, for his principals. Moyes instructed one Anthony, an insurance broker and agent in Brooklyn, who had on previous occasions obtained policies for Grace & Co., to procure the required amount of insurance. Anthony obtained the policy in suit from the general agents in New York city of the defendant company, mailed or delivered it to Moyes, and by the latter it was delivered to Grace & Co. not later than the day succeeding its date. On the morning of October 6th one Carrol, for the insurance company, verbally notified Anthony that the company refused to carry the risk and required the policy to be returned. There is some conflict in the testimony as to what occurred between Carrol and Anthony on this occasion. But, in the view which the court takes of this case, it may be conceded that Anthony gave Carrol to understand that the policy would be returned to the company or its agents. The property insured was destroyed by fire on the night of October 6, 1877, or early on the morning of the 7th. Prior totthe gire neither of the 7th. Prior to the fire neither by whose instructions the policy was obtained, had any knowledge or notice of the conversation between Carrol and Anthony, or of the fact that the company had elected not to carry the risk. At the trial it was admitted that the contract between the parties was fully executed upon the delivery of the policy to the insured.

The eighth clause of the policy is in these words:

'This insurance may be terminated at any time at the request     of the assured, in which case the company shall retain only      the customary short rates for the time the policy has been in      force. The insurance may also be terminated at any time at     the option of the company, on giving notice to that effect      and refunding a ratable proportion of the premium for the      unexpired term of the policy. It is a part of this contract     that any person other than the assured, who may have procured      the insurance to be taken by this company, shall be deemed to      be the agent of the assured named in this policy, and not of this company, under any      circumstances whatever, or in any transaction relating to      this insurance.'

The court refused, although so requested by plaintiffs, to rule that Anthony was not, within the meaning of the policy, their agent for the purpose of receiving notice of its termination; but charged the jury, in substance, that Anthony was, for such purpose, to be deemed the agent of the insured. Exception was taken in proper form by plaintiffs, as well to the refusal to give their instruction, as to that given by the court to the jury. A verdict was returned for the company, and judgment thereon was entered.

Mr. Winchester Britton, for the plaintiffs in error.

[Argument of Counsel from 280-281 intentionally omitted]

Mr. JUSTICE HARLAN delivered the opinion of the court. After stating the facts in the above language, he said:


text: Talk:Grace v. American Centural Insurance Company of St. Louis


text:
Grace v. American Centural Insurance Company of St. Louis/Opinion of the Court

The charge, in connection with the opinion delivered by the learned judge who presided at the trial, indicates that, in his judgment, the words in the eighth clause-'It is a part of this contract that any person, other than the assured, who may have procured the insurance to be taken by this company, shall be deemed to be the agent of the assured named in this policy'-were intended to be qualified by the words 'in any transaction relating to this insurance.' Upon this ground it was ruled that notice of the termination of the policy was properly given to Anthony, who personally procured the insurance. We do not concur in this interpretation of the contract. The words in their natural and ordinary signification import nothing more than that the person obtaining the insurance was to be deemed the agent of the insured in all matters immediately connected with the procurement of the policy. Representations by that person in procuring the policy, were to be regarded as made by him in the capacity of agent of the insured. His knowledge or information, pending negotiations for insurance, touching the subject-matter of the contract, was to be deemed the knowledge or information of the insured. When the contract was consummated by the delivery of the policy he ceased to be the agent of the insured, if his employment was solely to procure the insurance. What the company meant by the clause in question, so far as it relates to the agency, for the one party or the other, of the person procuring the insurance, was, to exclude the possibility of such person being regarded as its agent, 'under any circumstances whatever, or in any transaction relating to this insurance.' This, we think, is not only the proper interpretation of the contract, but the only one at all consistent with the intention of the parties as gathered from the words used. There is, in our opinion, no room for a different interpretation. If the construction were doubtful then the case would be one for the application of the familiar rule that the words of an instrument are to be taken most strongly against the party employing them, and therefore, in cases like this, most favorably to the insured. The words are those of the company, not of the assured. If their meaning be obscure it is the fault of the company. If its purpose was to make notice, to the person procuring the insurance, of the termination of the policy, equivalent to notice to the insured, a form of expression should have been adopted which would clearly convey that idea, and thus prevent either party from being caught or misled.

As the uncontradicted evidence was that Anthony's agency or employment extended only to the procurement of the insurance, the jury should have been instructed that his agency ceased when the policy was executed, and that notice to him, subsequently, of its termination was ineffectual to work a rescission of the contract.

At the trial below evidence was offered by the company, and was permitted, over the objection of plaintiffs, to go to the jury, to the effect that, when this contract was made, there existed in the cities of New York and Brooklyn an established, well-known general custom in fire insurance business, which authorized an insurance company, entitled upon notice to terminate its policy, to give such notice to the broker by or through whom the insurance was procured. This evidence was inadmissible, because it contradicted the manifest intention of the parties as indicated by the policy. The objection to its introduction should have been sustained. The contract, as we have seen, did not authorize the company to cancel it upon notice merely to the party procuring the insurance,-his agency, according to the evidence, not extending beyond the consummation of the contract. The contract, by necessary implication, required notice to be given to the insured, or to some one who was his agent to receive such notice. An express written contract, embodying in clear and positive terms the intention of the parties, cannot be varied by evidence of usage or custom. In Barnard v. Kellogg, 10 Wall. 383, this court quotes with approval the language of Lord LYNDHURST, in Blackett v. Royal Ex. Assurance Co. 2 Cromp. & J. 249, that 'usage may be admissible to explain what is doubtful; it is never admissible to contradict what is plain.' This rule is based upon the theory that the parties, if aware of any usage or custom relating to the subject-matter of their negotiations, have so expressed their intention as to take the contract out of the operation of any rules established by mere usage or custom. Whatever apparent conflict exists in the adjudged cases as to the office of custom or usage in the interpretation of contracts, the established doctrine of this court is as we have stated. Partridge v. ''Ins. Co.'' 15 Wall. 573; Robinson v. U.S. 13 Wall. 365; The Delaware, 14 Wall. 603;''Nat. Bank v. Burkhardt'', 100 U.S. 692.

The record in this case presents a question of jurisdiction, which, although not raised by either party in the court below or in this court, we do not feel at liberty to pass without notice. Sullivan v. Steam-boat Co. 6 Wheat. 450. As the jurisdiction of the circuit court is limited, in the sense that it has no other jurisdiction than that conferred by the constitution and laws of the United States, the presumption is that a cause is without its jurisdiction unless the contrary affirmatively appears. Turner v. Bank of North America, 4 Dall. 8; Ex parte Smith, 94 U.S. 456; Robertson v. Cease, 94 U.S. 649. In the last case it is said that 'where jurisdiction depends upon the citizenship of the parties, such citizenship, or the facts which in legal intendment constitute it, should be distinctly and positively averred in the pleadings, or they should appear affirmatively and with equal distinctness in other parts of the record.' ''Ry. Co. v. Ramsey'', 22 Wall. 322; Briges v. Sperry, 95 U.S. 401. In Brown v. Keene, 8 Pet. 115, it is declared not to be sufficient that jurisdiction may be inferred argumentatively from averments in the pleadings; that the averments should be positive.

The present case was commenced in the supreme court of New York, and was thence removed, on the petition of the defendant, to the circuit court of the United States for the eastern district of New York. The record does not satisfactorily show the citizenship of the parties. The complaint, filed in the state court, shows that the firm of William R. Grace & Co., composed of William R. Grace, Michael P. Grace, and Charles R. Flint, is doing business in New York, and that William R. Grace and Charles R. Flint are residents of that state. The petition for the removal of the cause shows that the defendant is a corporation of the state of Missouri; that William R. Grace and Charles R. Flint reside in New York; and that Michael P. Grace is a resident of some state or country unknown to defendant, but other than the state of Missouri. The record, however, fails to show of what state the plaintiffs are citizens. They may be doing business in and have residence in New York, without necessarily being citizens of that state. They are not shown to be citizens of some state other than Missouri. Bingham v. Cabot, 3 Dall. 383; Abercrombie v. Dupuis, 1 Cranch, 343; Jackson v. Twentyman, 2 Pet. 136; Sullivan v. Fulton Steam-boat Co., supra; Hornthal v. Collector, 9 Wall. 565; Brown v. Keene, supra; Robertson v. Cease, supra.

It is true that the petition for removal, after stating the residence of the plaintiffs, alleges 'that there is, and was at the time when this action was brought, a controversy therein between citizens of different states.' But that is to be deemed the unauthorized conclusion of law which the petitioner draws from the facts previously averred. Then there is the bond given by the defendant on the removal of the cause, which recites the names of the firm of William R. Grace & Co., and describes it as 'of the county of Kings and state of New York.' If that bond may be considered as part of the record for the purpose of ascertaining the citizenship of the parties, the averment that the plaintiffs are 'of the county of Kings and state of New York' is insufficient to show citizenship. Bingham v. Cabot, 3 Dall. 382; Wood v. Wagnon, 2 Cranch, 9.

As the judgment must be reversed and a new trial had, we have felt it to be our duty, notwishstanding the record as presented to us fails to disclose a case of which the court below could take cognizance, to indicate, for the benefit of parties at another trial, the conclusion reached by us on the merits. And we have called attention to the insufficient showing as to the jurisdiction of the circuit court, so that, upon the return of the cause, the parties may take such further steps touching that matter as they may be advised.

The judgment is reversed and the cause remanded, with directions to set aside the judgment, and for such further proceedings as may not be inconsistent with this opinion.


text: Talk:Grace v. American Centural Insurance Company of St. Louis/Opinion of the Court


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State of Louisiana Folsom v. Mayor of the City of New Orleans

Robert Mott, ''Thos. J. Semmes and Henry B. Kelly'', for plaintiffs in error.

Henry C. Miller, for defendant in error.

FIELD, J.


text: Talk:State of Louisiana Folsom v. Mayor of the City of New Orleans


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State of Louisiana Folsom v. Mayor of the City of New Orleans/Opinion of the Court

The relators are the holders of two judgments against the city of New Orleans,-one for $26,850, the other for $2,000. Both were recovered in the courts of Louisiana,-the first in June, 1877, by the relators; the second in June, 1874, by parties who assigned it to them. Both judgments were for damages done to the property of the plaintiffs therein by a mob or riotous assemblage of people in the year 1873. A statute of the state made municipal corporations liable for damages thus caused within their limits. Rev. St. La. 1870, § 2453. The judgments were duly registered in the office of the comptroller of the city, pursuant to the provisions of the act known as No. 5 of the extra session of 1870, and the present proceeding was taken by the relators to compel the authorities of the city to provide for their payment. At the time the injuries complained of were committed, and one of the judgments was recovered, the city of New Orleans was authorized to levy and collect a tax upon property within its limits of $1.75 upon every $100 of its assessed value. At the time the other judgment was recovered this limit of taxation was reduced to $1.50 on every $100 of the assessed value of the property. By the constitution of the state adopted in 1879 the power of the city to impose taxes on property within its limits was further restricted to 10 mills on the dollar of the valuation. The effect of this last limitation is to prevent the relators, who are not allowed to issue executions against the city, from collecting their judgments, as the funds receivable from the tax thus authorized to be levied are exhausted by the current expenses of the city, which must first be met. The relators sought in the state courts to compel a levy by the city of taxes to meet their judgments at the rate permitted when the damages were done for which the judgments were obtained. They contended that the subsequent limitation imposed upon its power violated that clause of the federal constitution which prohibits a state from passing a law impairing the obligation of contracts, and also that clause of the fourteenth amendment which forbids a state to deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. The supreme court of the state, reversing the lower court, decided against the relators, and the same contention is renewed here.

The right to reimbursement for damages caused by a mob or riotous assemblage of people is not founded upon any contract between the city and the sufferers. Its liability for the damages is created by a law of the legislature, and can be withdrawn or limited at its pleasure. Municipal corporations are instrumentalities of the state for the convenient administration of government within their limits. They are invested with authority to establish a police to guard against disturbance; and it is their duty to exercise their authority so as to prevent violence from any cause, and particularly from mobs and riotous assemblages. It has therefore been generally considered as a just burden cast upon them to require them to make good any loss sustained from the acts of such assemblages which they should have repressed. The imposition has been supposed to create, in the holders of property liable to taxation within their limits, an interest to discourage and prevent any movements tending to such violent proceedings. But, however considered, the imposition is simply a measure of legislative policy, in no respect resting upon contract, and subject, like all other measures of policy, to any change the legislature may see fit to make, either in the extent of the liability or in the means of its enforcement. And its character is not at all changed by the fact that the amount of loss, in pecuniary estimation, has been ascertained and established by the judgments rendered. The obligation to make indemnity created by the statute has no more element of contract in it because merged in the judgments than it had previously. The term 'contract' is used in the constitution in its ordinary sense, as signifying the agreement of two or more minds, for considerations proceeding from one to the other, to do or not to do certain acts. Mutual assent to its terms is of its very essence.

A judgment for damages, estimated in money, is sometimes called by text writers a specialty or contract of record, because it establishes a legal obligation to pay the amount recovered; and, by a fiction of law, a promise to pay is implied where such legal obligation exists. It is on this principle that an action ex contractu will lie upon a judgment. Chit. Cont. (Perkins Ed.) 87. But this fiction cannot convert a transaction wanting the assent of parties into one which necessarily implies it. Judgments for torts are usually the result of violent contests, and, as observed by the court below, are imposed upon the losing party by a higher authority against his will and protest. The prohibition of the federal constitution was intended to secure the observance of good faith in the stipulation of parties against any state action. Where a transaction is not based upon any assent of parties, it cannot be said that any faith is pledged with respect to it; and no case arises for the operation of the prohibition. Garrison v. City of New York, 21 Wall. 203. There is therefore nothing in the liabilities of the city, by reason of which the relators recovered their judgments, that precluded the state from changing the taxing power of the city, even though the taxation be so limited as to postpone the payment of the judgments.

The clause of the fourteenth amendment cited is equally inoperative to restrain the action of the state. Conceding that the judgments, though founded upon claims to indemnity for unlawful acts of mobs or riotous assemblages, are property in the sense that they are capable of ownership and may have a pecuniary value, the relators cannot be said to be deprived of them so long as they continue an existing liability against the city. Although the present limitation of the taxing power of the city may prevent the receipt of sufficient funds to pay the judgments, the legislature of the state may, upon proper appeal, make other provision for their satisfaction. The judgments may also, perhaps, be used by the relators or their assigns as offsets to demands of the city; at least, it is possible that they may be available in various ways. Be this as it may, the relators have no such vested right in the taxing power of the city as to render its diminution by the state, to a degree affecting the present collection of their judgments, a deprivation of their property in the sense of the constitutional prohibition. A party cannot be said to be deprived of his property in a judgment because at the time he is unable to collect it.

The cases in which we have held that the taxing power of a municipality continues, notwithstanding a legislative act of limitation or repeal, are founded upon contracts; and decisions in them do not rest upon the principle that the party affected in the enforcement of his contract rights has been thereby deprived of any property, but upon the principle that the remedies for the enforcement of his contracts, existing when they were made, have been by such legislation impaired. The usual mode in which municipal bodies meet their pecuniary contracts is by taxation. And when, upon the faith that such taxation will be levied contracts have been made, the constitutional inhibition has been held to restrain the state from repealing or diminishing the power of the corporation so as to deprive the holder of the contract of all adequate and efficacious remedy. As we have often said, the power of taxation belongs exclusively to the legislative department of the government, and the extent to which it shall be delegated to a municipal body is a matter of discretion, and may be limited or revoked at the pleasure of the legislature. But, as we held in Wolff v. New Orleans, 103 U.S. 358, and repeated in Louisiana v. Pilsbury, 105 U.S. 278, in both cases, by the unanimous judgment of the court, the legislation in that respect is subject to this qualification, which attends all state legislation, that it—

'shall not conflict with the prohibitions of the constitution     of the United States, and, among other things, shall not      operate directly upon contracts of the corporation, so as to      impair their obligation by abrogating or lessening the means      of their enforcement. Legislation producing this latter     result, not indirectly as a consequence of legitimate      measures taken, as will sometimes happen, but directly by      operating upon those means, is prohibited by the      constitution, and must be disregarded,-treated as if never      enacted,-by all courts recognizing the constitution as the      paramount law of the land. This doctrine has been repeatedly     asserted by this court when attempts have been made to limit      the power of taxation of a municipal body, upon the faith of      which contracts have been made, and by means of which alone      they could be performed. * *  * However great the control of      the legislature over the corporation while it is in      existence, it must be exercised in subordination to the      principle which secures the inviolability of contracts.'

This doctrine can have no application to claims against municipal corporations founded upon torts of the character mentioned. Whether or not the state, in so limiting the power of the city to raise funds by taxation that it cannot satisfy all claims against it recognized by law, though not resting upon contract, does a wrong to the relators, which a wise policy and a just sense of public honor should not sanction, is not a question upon which this court can pass. If the action of the state does not fall within any prohibition of the federal constitution, it lies beyond the reach of our authority.

The question of the effect of legislation upon the means of enforcing an ordinary judgment of damages for a tort, rendered against the person committing it, in favor of the person injured, may involve other considerations, and is not presented by the case before us. Judgment affirmed.


text: Talk:State of Louisiana Folsom v. Mayor of the City of New Orleans/Opinion of the Court


text: Walsh v. Preston Preston

title: Walsh v. Preston Preston


text: Talk:Walsh v. Preston Preston

title: Talk:Walsh v. Preston Preston


text: Walsh v. Preston Preston/Opinion of the Court


text: Talk:Walsh v. Preston Preston/Opinion of the Court


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Dubuque Company v. Des Moines Valley Railroad Company

''Chas. A. Clark'', for plaintiff in error.

C. C. Nourse and B. F. Kauffman, for defendant in error.

WAITE, C. J.


text: Talk:Dubuque Company v. Des Moines Valley Railroad Company


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Dubuque Company v. Des Moines Valley Railroad Company/Opinion of the Court

The following are no longer open questions in this court:

(1) That the grant of lands to the territory of Iowa for the     improvement of the Des Moines river, made by the act of      August 8, 1846, c. 103, (9 St. 77,) did not extend above the      Raccoon Fork. Dubuque & P. R. Co. v. Litchfield, 23 How. 66.

(2) That, notwithstanding this, the odd-numbered sections     within five miles of the river, on each side above the      Raccoon Fork, and below the east branch, to which the Indian      title had been extinguished, were so far reserved, 'by      competent authority,' for the purpose of aiding in the      improvement of the Des Moines, that they did not pass under      the act of May 15, 1856, c. 28, (11 St. 9,) granting lands to      the state of Iowa to aid in the construction of certain      railroads; and—

(3) That the act of July 12, 1862, c. 161, (12 St. 543,)     'transferred the title from the United States and vested it      in the state of Iowa, for the use of its grantees under the      river grant.' Wolcott v. Des Moines Co. 5 Wall. 681; Will- iams v. Baker, 17 Wall. 144; Homestead Co. v. Valley R. Co.     Id. 153; Wolsey v. Chapman, 101 U.S. 767.

The lands involved in this suit are odd-numbered sections, located in Iowa, within five miles of the Des Moines, above the east fork, and it is insisted that they did not pass under the act of 1862, because (1) when the reservation for the river improvement was made the Indian title had not been extinguished, and they were not then part of the public lands of the United States; and (2) the reservation, as in fact made, was along the east branch and not the main river, where these lands are.

These objections present the only questions we have now to consider.

1. As to the Indian title. It is conceded that when the act of 1846 was passed all Indian titles had been extinguished, except such as belonged to certain bands of the Sioux. By a treaty between the United States and the Sacs and Foxes, the Medawah-Kanton, Wahpacoota, Wahpeton, and Sissetong bands or tribes of the Sioux, and the Ottowas, Iowas, Ottoes, and Missourias, concluded on the fifteenth of July, 1830, and proclaimed on the twenty-fourth of February, 1831, (7 St. 328,) certain lands were ceded and relinquished to the United States, 'to be assigned and allotted, under the direction of the president of the United States, to the tribes now living thereon, or to such other tribes as the president may locate thereon for hunting and other purposes.' The north line of this cession is described in the treaty as follows: 'Beginning at the upper fork of the Des Moines river and passing the source of the Little Sioux and Floyds rivers to the fork of the first creek, which falls into the Big Sioux or Calamet on the east side.' The lands north of this line were occupied by the Sioux, and those south were held by the United States for the purposes set forth in the treaty. Whether the lands in controversy in this suit are situated north or south of this boundary line depends on whether the east branch or the Lizard made the upper fork of the Des Moines, as understood by the parties when the treaty was concluded. If the Lizard, then all are north of the line; if the east branch, all, or nearly all, are south.

On the twenty-eighth of July and the fifth of August, 1851, treaties were negotiated with the Sioux, by which they surrendered all their title to lands in Iowa. The ratification of these treaties, in the form they were originally made, was not advised by the senate, but on the twenty-third of June, 1852, certain amendments were proposed, on the acceptance of which the president was authorized to conclude the treaties 'as amended.' The amendments were agreed to by the Indians on the fourth and eighth of September, 1852, and the ratification of the treaties was duly proclaimed on the twenty-fourth of February, 1853.

The grant to Iowa under the act of 1846 was of 'one equal moiety, in alternate sections, of the public lands, (remaining unsold and not otherwise disposed of, incumbered, or appropriated,) in a strip five miles in whdth on each side of said river, to be selected,' etc., and the odd-numbered sections were afterwards selected. A question arose as to the extent of this grant, and as early as February 23, 1848, the commissioner of the general land-office certified to the officers of the state that, in the opinion of 'his office,' the state was 'entitled to the alternate sections within five miles of the Des Moines river throughout the whole extent of that river within the limits of Iowa.' The state claimed that the grant extended from the mouth of the river to its source. Notwithstanding the opinion of the land-office and the claim of the state, a proclamation was issued by the president on the nineteenth of June, 1848, ordering into market some of the lands which lay above the Raccoon Fork. This led to a protest on the part of the officers of the state, and a correspondence between the representatives of the state in congress and the secretary of the treasury, whose department then had charge of the public lands, which resulted in the announcement by the secretary, on the second of March, 1849, of his opinion that the grant extended from the mouth to the source of the river, not, however, including any lands in the state of Missouri. In accordance with this opinion, instructions were issued from the general land-officers to the landofficers in Iowa, on the first of June, 1849, 'to withhold from sale all the lands situated in the odd-numbered sections within five miles on each side of the river above the Raccoon Fork.' This, however, did not settle the matter, and conflicting opinions were announced at various times by different officers of the executive departments of the government. Finally, on the twenty-second of February, 1851, the state officers formally notified the secretary of the interior, to whose department the charge of the public lands had before that time been assigned, of the demand by the state of 'all the odd sections of land within five miles of the Des Moines river above the Raccoon Fork.' After this the whole matter was brought before the president and cabinet, and the decision arrived at by them is indicated in the following letter of the secretary of the interior:

'DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

'WASHINGTON, October 29, 1851.

'SIR: I herewith return all the papers in the Des Moines     case, which were recalled from your office about the first of      the present month.

'I have considered and carefully reviewed my decision of the     twenty-sixth July last, and in doing so find that no decision      which I can make will be final, as the question involved      partakes more of a judicial than an executive character,      which must ultimately be determined by the judicial tribunals      of the country, and although my own opinion on the true      construction of the grant is unchanged, yet in view of the      great conflict of opinion among the executive officers of the      government, and also in view of the opinions of several      eminent jurists which have been presented to me in favor of      the construction contended for by the state, I am willing to      recognize the claim of the state, and to approve the      selections without prejudice to the rights, if any there be,      of other parties, thus leaving the question as to the proper      construction of the statute entirely open to the action of      the judiciary. You will please, therefore, as soon as may be     practicable, submit for my approval such lists as may have      been prepared, and proceed to report for like approval lists      of the alternate sections claimed by the state of Iowa above      the Raccoon Fork, as far as the surveys have progressed or may hereafter be completed and      returned.

'Very respectfully, etc., etc.,

'A. H. H. STUART, Secretary.

'The Commissioner of the General Land-Office.'

In obedience to these instructions, lists were made out as the surveys progressed, and submitted to the secretary for his approval. His last approval, before the passage of the railroad grant of 1856, was on the seventeenth of December, 1853. The lands now in controversy were not surveyed at that time, and were not included in this or any of the lists previously made.

It is undoubtedly true, as was said in Leavenworth, etc., R. Co. v. U.S. 92 U.S. 743, that, 'in the absence of words of unmistakable import,' it will not be presumed that congress has made a grant of lands to which the Indian title has not been extinguished; but there are, nevertheless, instances, as in the case of the Pacific railroads, where this has been done. Confessedly, however, in this case the congressional grant of 1846 did not include the lands now in controversy. Whatever reservation there was to interfere with the railroad grant of 1856 grew out of what was done by the executive officers of the government after the act of 1846 was passed, and while its effect was in doubt. That the state claimed all the alternate sections within five miles of the river, on each side, and as far north as the state line, is not denied. That the intention of the president and his cabinet was to make the reservation as broad as the claim, is, to our minds, perfectly apparent from the language of the instructions of the secretary of the interior to the commissioner of the general land-office in his communication of the twenty-ninth of October, 1851. His words are: 'I am willing to recognize the claim of the state, and approve the selections without prejudice to the rights, if any there be, of others, thus leaving the question as to the proper construction of the statute entirely open to the action of the judiciary.' He then directed lists of selections to be prepared, and submitted for his approval, as the surveys were completed and returned. At this time all the Indian title that could, by any possibility, interfere with the grant, as claimed by the state, was in the process of extinguishment. Treaties which were to have that effect had already been negotiated with the Indians, and were waiting ratification by the United States. There could hardly have been a doubt in the minds of any of the parties that long before any judicial determination of the matters in dispute every vestige of Indian title would be gone. Hence, to leave 'the question of the construction of the statute'-that is to say, the effect of the grant-'entirely open,' all the lands within the limit, surveyed or unsurveyed, and, as we think, incumbered by an Indian title or unincumbered, were reserved from sale until the 'action of the judiciary.' This reservation was in force when the act of 1856 was passed, and it is the reservation which this court had held prevented the grant under that act from attaching to the lands within the limits of the river grant, as claimed by the state. The act of 1862 afterwards, in express terms, granted to the state, for the use of its grantees, 'the alternate sections, designated by odd numbers, lying within five miles of said river, between the Raccoon Fork and the northern boundary of the state.' At this time there was no Indian title in the way of the grant, and if the reservation was good as against the railroad companies in 1856, the title of the Des Moines Valley Railroad Company, the grantee of the state, was perfected.

2. As to the east branch. Much of what has been said about the Indian title applies to this objection. The state claimed the lands along the river, and the reservation as promulgated was of what was claimed. No one now supposes the east branch was in fact the Des Moines river. It is undoubtedly true that at some time some officers of the government, as well as some officers of the state, supposed the branch was the main river, and acted accordingly, but that does not change the geographical fact that what was taken for the river was only a branch. The lists of selections along the branch, and their approval by the secretary, were mistakes, which the record shows were corrected in the final settlements between the state and the United States by allowances in account. The same may be said of the marks on the plats sent out from the general land-office to the local land-officers. They were clerical mistakes, growing out of an imperfect knowledge of the geography of the country. They did not change the reservation, but only gave wrong information as to what it was. There is no question of estoppel as a consequence of the mistake involved. The railroad grant of 1856 was subject to the reservation for the river grant. There is no pretense of fraud anywhere, and the record does not show that the conduct of the appellants or their grantors has been in any way influenced by the plats or the unauthorized selections and certificates. They knew, or ought to have known, that the reservation was confined to the river lands, and that the branch was not the river. Hence the reservation is to have effect according to its terms, and not according to any mistaken interpretation which may at some time have been given to it.

We find no error in the record, and the judgment is affirmed.


text: Talk:Dubuque Company v. Des Moines Valley Railroad Company/Opinion of the Court


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Keyes v. United States

The appellant brought a suit against the United States, in the court of claims, on the second of February, 1880, claiming to recover the sum of $4,236.36, for his pay as a second lieutenant in the fifth regiment of cavalry, in the army of the United States, from the twenty-eighth of April, 1877. That court dismissed his petition, on the following facts found by it: In February, 1877, the appellant was tried on four charges and specifications, before a general court-martial composed of 10 officers. One of them, Col. Merritt, was the colonel of the fifth cavalry. They were all present. The appellant being before the court, and the order appointing it being read, he was asked if he had any objection to any member of the court present, named in the order, to which he replied in the negative. The oaths were then administered to the members of the court in the presence of the appellant. The first three of the charges and specifications were preferred by the lieutenant colonel of the fifth cavalry and the fourth by Col. Merritt. The appellant was represented by counsel of his own selection. He pleaded not guilty. Col. Merritt was sworn as a witness on the part of the government, and gave testimony in support of the charge and specifications preferred by him, but gave no testimony in regard to the other charges and specifications. The day after the appellant pleaded not guilty, he withdrew, by leave of the court, his plea of not guilty of the second charge and its specifications, and entered a plea of guilty thereto. Col. Merritt continued to sit as a member of the court throughout the trial, and participated in rendering the final judgment. At the close of the evidence the appellant submitted, in writing, a statement of his defense, which was read to the court. It contained no objection or reference to the participation of Col. Merritt in the trial as a member of the court, or to his having been so sworn and examined as a witness on behalf of the government. The court found the appellant guilty of all the charges and specifications, and sentenced him to be dismissed from the service. The proceedings, findings, and sentence of the court were approved by the president of the United States, who ordered that the sentence should take effect on the twenty-eighth of April, 1877. On the twenty-seventh of June, 1877, the senate not being in session, the president appointed Henry J. Goldman to be a second lieutenant in the fifth regiment of cavalry, and on the fifteenth of October, 1877, he nominated Goldman to the senate for appointment as second lieutenant in said regiment, in the place of the appellant, dismissed, to date from June 15, 1877. The senate advised and consented to the appointment of Goldman, and he was accordingly commissioned and still holds the office of such second lieutenant.

James Coleman, for appellant.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 338-339 intentionally omitted]

Asst. Atty. Gen. Maury, for appellee.

BLATCHFORD, J.

title: Keyes v. United States


text: Talk:Keyes v. United States

title: Talk:Keyes v. United States


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Keyes v. United States/Opinion of the Court

So far as regards the time after June 15, 1877, the fact that Goldman was appointed by the president, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, a second lieutenant in the fifth cavalry, in the place of the appellant, from June 15, 1877, and was commissioned as such, and accepted and held the appointment, is a bar to the suit of the appellant. It was held by this court, in Blake v. U.S. 103 U.S. 227, that the president has the power to supersede or remove an officer of the army by the appointment of another in his place, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, and that such power was not withdrawn by the provision in section 5 of the act of July 13, 1866, c. 176, (14 St. at Large, 92,) now embodied in section 1229 of the Revised Statutes, that 'no officer in the military or naval service shall, in time of peace, be dismissed from service, except upon and in pursuance of the sentence of a court-martial to that effect, or in commutation thereof.' It was held that this provision did not restrict the power of the president, by and with the advice and consent of the senate, to displace officers of the army or navy, by the appointment of others in their places.

In regard to the rest of the time covered by the suit, it becomes necessary to decide the question raised as to the validity of the sentence of the court-martial. It is contended for the appellant that the court-martial had no jurisdiction to try him; that the fact that he made no objection to any member of the court was not a consent upon his part which conferred jurisdiction on the court-martial; and that the fact that Col. Merritt was prosecutor, witness, and judge rendered the proceedings of the court-martial void. The position is taken that, although there is no statute or regulation which forbids what was done in this case, the sentence of a court-martial in which one of the judges is prosecutor and witness is absolutely void, and that neither what the appellant said nor what he omitted to say, at the time, can cure the defect in the organization of the court.

That the court-martial, as a general court-martial, had cognizance of the charges made, and had jurisdiction of the person of the appellant, is not disputed. This being so, whatever irregularities or errors are alleged to have occurred in the proceedings, the sentence of dismissal must be held valid when it is questioned in this collateral way. Thompson v. Tolmie, 2 Pet. 157; Voorhees v. Bank of U.S. 10 Pet. 449; Cornett v. Williams, 20 Wall. 226, 249. This doctrine has been applied by this court to the judgment and sentence of a naval general court-martial, which was sought to be reviewed on a writ of ''habeas corpus. Ex parte Reed'', 100 U.S. 13.

Where there is no law authorizing the court-martial, or where the statutory conditions as to the constitution or jurisdiction of the court are not observed, there is no tribunal authorized by law to render the judgment. Of that character are the authorities cited and relied on by the appellant; but they do not apply to the present case.

Under the foregoing views we express no opinion as to the propriety of the proceeding of the court-martial in the respects in which they are assailed.

The judgment of the court of claims is affirmed.

Mr. Justice FIELD did not sit in this case or take part in its decision.


text: Talk:Keyes v. United States/Opinion of the Court


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Inhabitants of the Township of Bernards v. Stebbins

Alvah A. Clark and ''Thos. N. McCarter'', for Inhabitants of Township of bernards.

H. C. Pitney, for Stebbins, Ex'r, etc.

Cortland Parker, for Morrison and Hutchinson.

GRAY, J.

These are appeals by a township in New Jersey from decrees of the circuit court of the United States for the district of New Jersey, upon bills in equity by the appellees for relief against the accidental omission of seals on its bonds. The facts appearing by the record, are as follows:

By the General Laws of New Jersey, the inhabitants of each township in the state are a body politic and corporate, by the name of 'The Inhabitants of the township of _____, in the county of _____.' Rev. St. N. J. 1877, p. 1191. On the ninth of April, 1868, the legislature of New Jersey passed a statute entitled 'An act to authorize certain towns in the counties of Somerset, Morris, Essex, and Union to issue bonds and take stock in the Passaic Valley & Peapack Railroad Company,' the first section of which directed the circuit court of either of those counties, on the application of 12 or more freeholders and residents of any township therein, situated along the route of the railroad, to appoint three 'commissioners for such township to carry into effect the purposes and provisions of this act.' The next two sections are as follows:

'Sec. 2. It shall be lawful for said commissioners to borrow,     on the faith and credit of their respective townships, such      sum of money, not exceeding ten per centum of the valuation      of the real estate and landed property of such township, to      be ascertained by the assessment rolls thereof respectively      for the year eighteen hundred and sixty-seven, for a term not      exceeding twenty-five years, at a rate of interest not      exceeding seven per centum per annum, payable semi-annually,      and to execute bonds therefor, under their hands and seals      respectively. The bonds so to be executed may be in such     sums, and payable at such times and places as the said      commissioners and their successors may deem expendient; but      no such debt shall be contracted or bonds issued by said      commissioners of or for either of said townships until the      written consent shall have been obtained of the majority of      the tax-payers of such township, or their legal      representatives, appearing upon the last assessment roll, as      shall represent a majority of the landed property of such      township (including lands owned by non-residents) appearing      upon the last assessment roll of such township. Such consent shall state the amount of money     authorized to be raised in such township, and that the same      is to be invested in the stock of the said railroad company,      and the signatures shall be proved by one or more of the      commissioners. The fact that the persons signing such consent     are a majority of the tax-payers of such township, and      represent a majority of the real property of such township,      shall be proved by the affidavit of the assessor of such      township, indorsed upon or annexed to such written consent,      and the assessor of such township is hereby required to      perform such service. Such consent and affidavit shall be     filed in the office of the clerk of the county in which such      township is situated, and a certified copy thereof in the      town clerk's office of such township, and the same, or a      certified copy thereof, shall be evidence of the facts      therein contained, and received as evidence in any court in      this state, and before any judge or justice thereof.


text: Talk:Inhabitants of the Township of Bernards v. Stebbins