The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1892-04-06
The BELLE PI AINE CASE.

TOPEKA, Kan, April 5.-The citizens oil
| Belle Piaine township in Sumner county,
some time ago brought suit against the
! Missouri Pacific railway company as sue
| iantic, TO compel Ii to carry out con
| tract entered into between the officers oi
! the last named road and the township OF
! Belle Plaine
In their petition the complainants set
| forth at length the history of their nego-
tiations with the company, by which 1T ap-
| pears that the company in consideration
| OF SIS, 600 in bonds agreed TO build a rail
road through the township and further TO
make the city of Belle Plaine division
headquarters, with offices, machine shops,
! round house, turn tables, ETC., and also TO
| operate any and all branches of said road
in Sumner county from Belle Plaiue. Also
to make the railway n continuous line
from Denver. Col. to Memphis, Team.
The plaintiff claimed that none of the
provisions of the contract were CARED out
| and appealed to the board TO compel the
Missouri Pacific to fulfill the contract
entered into the original company.
The railway company, in making ans
wer. deny all the allegations of the com
plaInants and produce in evidence the af-
fidavlt of j. j. Burns, president and vice
president alternately, of the original rail-
way company. Burns swears that the
proposition submitted to the township OF
Belle Plaine, upon which the bonds of the
township to the amount of S2S, 900 were
voted, contained only the usual conditions
and did not contain any condition or pro-
vision whatever for the location and main
taiuance of division headquarters, as
charged in the complaint and petition of
the officers and citizens of Belle Plaine
township.
Burns further swears that afterward the
company submitted to the city Of Belle
Plaine a proposition to vote S25, 900 in
bonds III aid of said railway, which propo-
sition was almost unanimously carried by a
popular vote and the bonds were executed
and placed in escrow. That subsequently,,
in consequence of certain embarrass-
ments 10y litigation aud when
$1,000 of these bonds had been
earned by the said railway com
pany, by the construction of its line in the
direction of kipgman, the company abau
doned It's plans aud notified the officers of
the city of Belle Plaine, whereupon the
bonds which had been earned and the re-
mainder which were held in escrow, were
returned TO the city end the stock which
had been issued in exchange was surren
dered to the railway company and the con-
tract with the city given up and aban-
doued
In passing upon the complaint the rail-
road commissioners say: without as
SumlnS TO enter into the merits oil tins
case it is but proper and just to both par
ties to state that the trial of the issue here
joined is not within the jurisdiction of
this board. While we have in some in
stances lent our assistance in a prelimin-
ary examination of cases not widely dis
similar TO this, we regard this as Of too
grave import and involving too many in
tricate points of law to be considered by a
tribunal which has no power to apply
remedy if wrong has been done. The
case is therefore dismissed without pre- ju
dice and will be stricken from this docket"
The case will be taken into the courts.