The weekly democratic statesman. [volume] (Austin, Tex.) 1871-1883, 1882-08-10
FORFEITURE OF TEXAS PAClF-
nc LAND GRANT.

LIZ TcpOTL LuduC ny IuO JuulOlalg
committee of the house, declaring
the forfeiture of the land grant to
the Texas Pacific railway company
was not a full committee report, on
ly eight members signing. A mi
nority report was signed by Peyson,
Townshend, Manning, Culberson
and Hammond. The report which
accompanies the resolution of forfeit
IRE recites, that the road was to have
been built from Marshall, Texas,
near the thirty-second parallel, to
Ell Paso; thence through New
Mexico and Arizona, to a point on
the Rio Colorado at or near the
southern boundary of California,
and thence to San Diego. To COLI
meet the Texas and Pacific with San
Francisco, the Southern Pacific rail-
road of California was authorized to
build a road to the Colorado liver.
The company was granted twenty
alternate sections of land per mile on
each side of the line through the ter
ritories and ten alternate sections
per mile on each side of the line in
California. The land embraced in
the grant is estimated at 14,309,7OO
acres. The time Tor completing the
line was extended to May 2, 1882.
The length of the entire line is esti-
mated at 1883 miles, but proof of the
construction of only ISL miles of
road in Texas has been furnished
the secretary of the interior. The
Texas and Pacific have never COM
pleted any part of the route for
which the land grant was made,
whatever part of the railroad that
has been built east from San Diego
having been constructed by the
Southern Pacific company, to whom
the Texas and Pacific have attempt
ed to transfer the land grant i'll
question. Under the seventeenth
section of the act of March, 1871
which resembles the eighth and
ninth sections of the charter of the
Northern Pacific-it might have been
argued that the only right which
congress had reserved was the right
to complete the road. But the Texas
aud Pacific haying made no effort to
carry out its part of the contract,
there can be no question as to the
right of the United States to resume
possession of the grant unless the
Southern Pacific has acquired rights
by virtue of a deed of release.
The report then examines the
question as to whether the
Texas and Pacific had power to
assign the lands before building the
road, and finds that it had not. The
resolution as reported was as fol-
lows:
"ResoIred, By the senate and house
of representatives, etc., as follows I:
That all lands granted to the Texas
Pacific railroad company under the
act of congress entitled 'An act to
incorporate the Texas Pacific rail-
road company and to aid in the con-
struction of its road and for other
purposes approved March 8, 1871,
and acts amendatory thereof or sup
Elemental thereto, be and they are
hereby declared forfeited, and that
the whole of said lands be restored
to the public domain and made SUBJ
ject to sale and settlement under eX-
listing laws of the United States.'"
The minority concurred in the
recommendation, but express an
unwillingness to be commit
ted to the doctrine that the
United States might be deprived of
its right to enforce a forfeiture of
the lands granted to this or any
other railroad company for breach
of the conditions upon which such
grant was made simply because con-
gress may have reserved the power
"to adopt such measures as 1T may
deem necessary and proper to secure
the speedy completion of the road
in aid of which the lands were
granted, and because the company
notwithstanding the breach, may be
proceeding with its work. The mi
nority commended that nothing could
be better settled or more universally
conceded than that the grantor of an
estate, upon conditions subsequent,
may, unless his right be especially
waived or lost by his own laches, re-
enter upon the breach of any condi-
ton upon which the estate may de-
pend and that upon such re-entry
the estate of the grantee becomes
void 06 initiO; that it is equally as
we'll settled that laches are never to
be imputed to the government. Both
of these principles, it is held, were
recently asserted by the committee
with great clearness and force in the
case of the Ontonagon and Brule
land grant; that if, therefore, the
government as grantor has the
right, without regard to the lapse of
time, to reinvest itself with such an
estate, it is impossible to see how it
can be deprived of the power to do
so simply because it has reserved to
itself the right to do something in
addition; that question as to the
policy of insisting upon such forfeit
ure is one thing, the naked legal
right to enforce it quite another.
The minority refused to assent to
any reasoning in the report tending
to establish the proposition that the
right of absolute forfeiture does not
exist either in this grant or that to
the Northern Pacific railroad COM
pany in case of breach of any con-
dition upon which such grant was
made.
The STATESMAN is against any
purpose of an opposing clique to
defeat Hon. A. w. TerrelPs nominal
ton for the state senatorship. His