In this case, the writ of error was dismissed because the
judgment below rested upon a construction by the state court of a
statute of the state, which was sufficiently broad to sustain the
judgment.
This case comes to us on error from the Supreme Court of the
State of Alabama. On the 3d of June, 1856, Congress made a grant of
public lands to the State of Alabama
Page 150 U. S. 133
to aid in the construction of certain railroads. 11 Stat. 17, c.
24. This grant was renewed and extended by an Act of April 10,
1869. 16 Stat. 459, c. 24. By a joint resolution of the Legislature
of the State of Alabama approved January 20, 1858, Acts 1857-1858,
p. 430, certain railroad companies were made the beneficiaries of
this grant. The Alabama and Chattanooga Railroad Company was formed
by a consolidation, under the authority of the state, of two of
these companies, and became thereby one of such beneficiaries. On
February 11, 1870, an act was passed, Acts 1869-70, No. 101, pp.
89-92, loaning two millions of dollars of the bonds of the state to
this company and providing for the execution of a mortgage by the
company on all its property, including the land grant, to secure
this loan. The bonds were delivered to the company, and on March 2,
1870, the mortgage called for by the last-named act was executed.
Thereafter the railroad company, defaulting in the payment of its
obligations to the state, was thrown into bankruptcy, and its
property, including this land grant, was, on judicial sale, after
proper proceedings in the district court of the United States,
purchased by the state in satisfaction of such obligations. The
title thus acquired the defendants in error hold under a conveyance
from the state, made by virtue of what is called the "debt
settlement" Act of the General Assembly, Acts 1875-76, No. 38, pp.
130, 149, and they were proceeding to enforce their right to the
lands in controversy in this suit by an action of ejectment.
The title of the plaintiffs in error arose in this way: Joab
Bagley claimed to have purchased the lands in controversy from the
Alabama and Chattanooga Railroad Company under two contracts of
date, respectively, September 13, 1870, and January 24, 1871, with
one Daniel J. Duffy, its agent. There was some dispute in the
testimony as to whether Duffy was duly authorized to act as the
agent of the company, and also whether the company ever in fact
received the moneys paid by Bagley, but, for the purposes of this
suit, it may be assumed that Duffy was authorized to sell, and that
the company received the moneys. No conveyance, however, was made
by
Page 150 U. S. 134
the company to Bagley. This suit was commenced in July, 1884, by
D. B. Miller, who claims under sundry mesne conveyances from
Bagley, in the Chancery Court of Jefferson County, Alabama, against
John Swann and John A. Billups, trustees, and others, the object of
which was to enforce the specific performance of the two contracts
of September 13, 1870, and January 24, 1871, and to enjoin the
further prosecution of the action of ejectment. On the 20th of
June, 1885, the Chancellor entered a decree in favor of the
complainant, which decree was reversed by the supreme court of the
state. 82 Ala. 530. An amended bill having been filed, the case was
again submitted to the chancellor, who, on November 12, 1888,
entered a decree dismissing the complainant's bill, which decree
was affirmed by the supreme court on the second of May, 1890. 89
Ala. 631. Subsequently to the commencement of the suit, Miler died,
and the suit was revived in the names of his executor and heirs.
The two original trustees have also died, and Frank Y. Anderson and
W. J. Cameron have been substituted as their successors.
MR. JUSTICE BREWER, after stating the facts in the foregoing
language, delivered the opinion of the Court.
It is contended by defendants in error that whatever questions
may be found in the case, the decision of the Supreme Court of
Alabama was upon a question not of a federal character, and one
broad enough to sustain the judgment, and therefore that this Court
has no jurisdiction, and should dismiss the case.
Hale v.
Akers, 132 U. S. 554;
Hopkins v. McLure, 133 U. S. 380;
Blount v. Walker, 134 U. S. 607;
Wood Mowing & Reaping Co. v. Skinner, 139 U.
S. 293;
Henderson Bridge Co. v. Henderson City,
141 U. S. 679;
Delaware City &c. Navigation Co. v. Reybold,
142 U. S. 636.
As the mortgage to the state was executed some months before the
contracts with Bagley, the title held by the State of Alabama under
the bankruptcy proceedings would
prima
Page 150 U. S. 135
facie be paramount to that acquired by Bagley.
Wilson v. Boyce, 92 U. S. 320. To
avoid this, it was contended that, under the Act of February 11,
1870, and the mortgage of March 2, 1870, the railroad company, the
mortgagor, was given the right to sell these lands, and the
question which was considered and determined by the supreme court
of the state, and the vital question was whether the act and
mortgage gave such authority. The Act of February, 1870, provided
that
"the said Alabama and Chattanooga Railroad Company shall have
the privilege and right of selling said lands or any part thereof
in accordance with the acts of Congress granting the same."
The mortgage contained the same provision. In respect to this,
the supreme court of the state thus expressed itself:
"This reservation was incorporated in the mortgage, and its
construction, as applied to the facts of the case, is the
controlling question for us to decide. The power retained by the
mortgagor was not an unlimited power to sell. It was a power to
sell only in accordance with the terms and conditions of the act of
Congress making the grant, which, we have said in a former
decision, was 'a law as well as a grant.' If these terms and
conditions were followed, then the lien of the mortgage was by
agreement to be released. If they were not followed as to the mode
or time prescribed or otherwise, then the contract of the parties
is that the lien of the mortgage is to remain unaffected.
Compliance with the essential requirements of the act of Congress
became thus a condition precedent to the divestiture of title out
of the state as mortgagee. This, we repeat, was the express
contract between the parties. It is sufficiently shown in the
former opinion in this case that the attempt to sell to Bagley was
in direct violation of the terms of the law of Congress, and
therefore necessarily also in violation of the agreement of the
parties to the mortgage, which was based on that law.
Swann v.
Miller, 82 Ala. 530. The lien of the mortgage for this reason
remained undischarged. This we understand to be the natural and
just construction of the mortgage agreement and of the act of the
Alabama General Assembly approved February, 1870, above cited.
"
Page 150 U. S. 136
Section 4 of the Act of Congress of June, 1856, is as
follows:
"SEC. 4.
And be it further enacted that the lands
hereby granted to said state shall be disposed of by said state
only in manner following, that is to say: that a quantity of land,
not exceeding one hundred and twenty sections for each of said
roads, and included within a continuous length of twenty miles of
each of said roads, may be sold, and when the governor of said
state shall certify to the Secretary of the Interior that any
twenty continuous miles of any of said roads is completed, then
another quantity of land hereby granted, not to exceed one hundred
and twenty sections for each of said roads, having twenty
continuous miles completed as aforesaid and included within a
continuous length of twenty miles of each of such roads, may be
sold, and so from time to time until said roads are completed, and
if any of said roads is not completed within ten years, no further
sale shall be made, and the lands unsold shall revert to the United
States."
These lands confessedly were not part of the first one hundred
and twenty sections which the state might sell prior to the
construction of any portion of the road, and there is no pretense
that at the time of these contracts of Bagley's, any certificate
had been made by the governor of the state to the Secretary of the
Interior as provided in the act. The supreme court, in its first
opinion, held that under the act of 1870 and the reservation in the
mortgage, the railroad company had absolutely no power to sell
until the making of that certificate, and that any attempted sale
made prior thereto was a nullity -- not voidable, but absolutely
void. Now whether that was a correct construction or not of the act
of 1870 and the reservation of the mortgage is a purely local
question, and involves nothing of a federal character. The question
is not what rights passed to the state under the acts of Congress,
but what authority the railroad company had under the statute of
the state. The construction of such a statute is a matter for the
state court, and its determination thereof is binding on this
Court. The fact that the state statute and the mortgage refer to
certain acts of Congress as prescribing the rule and measure of the
rights granted by the
Page 150 U. S. 137
state does not make the determination of such rights a federal
question. A state may prescribe the procedure in the federal courts
as the rule of practice in its own tribunals; it may authorize the
disposal of its own lands in accordance with the provisions for the
sale of the public lands of the United States, and in such cases an
examination may be necessary of the acts of Congress, the rules of
the federal courts, and the practices of the Land Department, and
yet the questions for decision would not be of a federal character.
The inquiry along federal lines is only incidental to a
determination of the local question of what the state has required
and prescribed. The matter decided is one of state rule and
practice. The facts by which that state rule and practice are
determined may be of a federal origin.
We see nothing in the cases of
St. Louis &c. Railway Co.
v. McGee, 115 U. S. 469, and
Doe v. Larmore, 116 U. S. 198,
conflicting with these views or throwing any light on this
question. These cases involved simply a consideration of the effect
to be given to the later act of Congress in respect to the rights
of the state in the lands, and held that the later act was not to
be considered as a new and independent grant, but simply as an
extension of time.
Our conclusion, therefore, is that as the construction of the
statute of 1870 and following mortgage presented no question of a
federal nature -- as upon that construction the supreme court
decided the case -- and an such question is sufficiently broad to
sustain the judgment, the case must be
Dismissed.
