Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1869-07-13
Recent Supreme Court Decision against
Raising Money by Tax to be Donated
for Railroads,

4uo AOiiVWluS uiuOAiey OPihiVa "a
the Supreme Court was given by
Judge Byron Paine in the celebrated
case in which the majority, Dixon
and Cole, decided that the people
may not tax themselves when the
money to be raised is to be given as
condition of building railroads:
"Railroads are the great public
highways of the world, along which
its gigantic currents of trade and
travel continually pour. Highways
compared with which the most mag
nifcent highways of antiquity dwin>
die into insignifcance. They are
the most marvellous invention of
modern times. They have done
more to develope the wealth and re-
sources, to stimulate the industry,
reward the labor, and promote the
general comfort and prosperity of
the country than any other; and,
perhaps, than all other mere physical
causes combined. There is probably
not o man, woman or child, whose
interest or comfort has not been in
some degree subserved by them
They bring to our doors the produc
tons of the earth !; they enable us
to anticipate and protract the seas
ons they enable the inhabitants of
each cline to enjoy the pleasures and
Injuries of all they scatter the pros
ducJions of the press and of litera-
ture broadcast through the country
with amazing rapidity. There is
scarcely want, wish, or aspiration
OF the human heart which they do
not in some way help to crafty
They promote the pleasure of social
life and of friendship; they bring
the skilled physician quickly from a
distance to attend the sick or the
wounded, and enable the absent
friend to be present at the bedside OF
the dying. They more than realized
the fabulous conception of the East
ern imagination, which pictured the
genii as transporting inhabited pal
aces from the Atlantic coast, and
with marvellous swiftness deposit it
on the shores which are washed by
the Pacific seas. In war thew trans.
port the armies and supplies of the
Government, with the greatest oe-
lerity, and carry forward, as it were,
on the wings of the wing, relief and
comfort to those who are stretched
bleeding and wounded on the field of
battle. F.
And yet notwithstanding all these
tremendous results, Notwithstanding
that States, counties, towns and cities
of the country, fully approaching
their Importance, have been bending
all their energies to the construction
of these great highways-notwith-
standing the General Government
has donated vast tracts of its domain
TO aid in the object, we are now told
that the public has not sufficient in
terest in the construction OF rail-
road to sustain an exercise of the
taxing power, because, forsooth, in
executing the great public work the
State has made use of the agency of
a private corporation, and left to it
the comparatively petty and unlm-
portant profits to be derived from
the actual operation of the road l
confess that such conclusion is SO
utterly in conflict with what / had
supposed to be the settled law-so
inadequate to what seems TO be the
real merits of the great question in,
volved-that is matter of astonish.
ment that it could have been adopted
by any mind"