Arizona silver belt., 1897-09-30
THURSDAY. SEPTEMBER 30. 1897,
THE PIMA AND YAVAPAI SUB-
 SIDY BONDS.

'It has been charged that the so, called Pima county bonds would be similarly refunded. The governor says they will not be. Though they were issued under similar legislative authority, there is no other similarity between the two debts. The Tucson X Globe road was never built and it is charged was never intended to be built. The bonds are said to have passed out of the control of the county in an irregular manner. 80 that the county claimed it was bound by no moral obligation to redeem them. The supreme court of the United States decided that it was bound by no legal obligation, and the supreme court of this territory last spring denied a writ of mandamus, compelling the loan commission to refund them under the amended act. ."-Phoenix Repub- lican.
 Governor McCord and the Repub. lican display lamentable ignorance of the facts in contepding that there is no similarity between the Yavapai and Pima county railroad bond obligations other than that the bonds were issued under similar legislative authority. Act No. 35, 'To promote the construc- ton of certain railroad" (the Arizona Narrow Gauge, in Pima county), and Act No. 62, ''To encourage the con- struction of the Prescott and Thirty fifth Parallel Railroad" were the creations of the Twelfth legislative assembly of 1883, and are similar in intent and involve the same amount to be paid by the respective counties as a subsidy for the construction of rail road. Both acts were invalid, being in conflict with the net of congress of 1878, amendatory of section 1889 of the Organic Act, denying the territorial legislature the right to authorize any town, city or other municipal corpora ton to incur "sny debt or obligation other than such as shall bs necessary to the administration of its internal affairs" It was on this ground and not, as the governor maintains, upon the ground that the bonds passed out of the control of the county in an irregular manner, that the courts de- cided in favor of Pima county.
 The decision of the supreme court of the United States in the case of Charles Edward Lewis, appellant, vs. Pima county is to be found in the U. s. Su- preme Court Reports, volume l55, pages 54 to 5S. Justice Brown, who delivered the opinion, says: ''In the face of these restrictions upon its power the legislature of Arizona on February 21,, 1883, passed the act in question, making it the duty of the boa-d of supervisors to issue S200, 900 of county bonds and to deliver the same to the railroad company in ex- change for corresponding bonds of such company. Now, unless debt thus incurred in aid of the construction of railroad can be said to be an obi gation necessary to the administration of the internal affairs of Pima county, it must necessarily follow, irrespective of every other consideration, that the legislature exceeded its powers in authorizing and requiring the county to issue its bonds in exchange for those of the railroad company in question and that the bonds are void.
 "The question is too clear for ex- tended argument. By the internal affairs of municipal corporation, in the administration of which the legisla- ture could alone authorize it to incur debt, was undoubtedly intended such business as municipalities of like char acter are usually required to engage in to fulfill their proper functions, and to effectuate their charters. In the case of counties these are ordinarily to pro vide court house a jail a poor house ' offices for the various officials It could never have been contemplated, however, that this power would be used to incar obligations in favor of railroad operated by private corpora ton for private gain, though also sub- serving public purpose.
 "We are compelled to hold that the bonds in question create no obligation against the county which court of law can enforce.
 1.-The judgment of the court below is, therefore affirmed"
 The question as to whether the rail road company had fulfilled its part of the contract was not raised. If the act of the legislature authorizing the county to issue bonds in favor of a rail road is illegal all acts performed in compliance with the provisions of that law are void. Therefore, if the Pima county bonds were void, as the Su- preme Court of the United States de- clared them to be, then 1t follows un- questionably that the Yayapai bonds were also illegal, and the discussion between our Prescott and Phoenix con semporaries as to whether the P. & A. c. company operated its road and full slled its agreement with the county is not material, except in the event that