The Semi-weekly leader., 1920-02-04
C. & S. |. DEFENDANT
IN $3,0O0,OOO SUIT
Revenue Agent Files Claim for
Damages-COntract Said to
Have Been Broken.

A law suit, which promises to be
the largest and probably most vitality
important to the state and people of
Mississippi, ever filed in the last
half century, has just been brought
in the Chancery Court of the First
District of this county by Stokes v.
Robertson, State Revenue Agent and
Judge V. j. Stricken, attorney, a
gainst the Gulf & Ship Island Rail-
road Company.
The bill in the case charges the
railroad company with having fla
grantly and fraudulantly violated it's
contract with the State of Missis-
sippi, after having received from the
state grant of some 250,000 acres
of the finest virgin pine lands, grant
ed to the company upon the condit-
ion and the contract that 1t would
build railroad from the coast of
Brandon and thence through the CEN
tral portion of the state to Pontotoc,
Miss, and on to the Tennessee line.
This suit was the discovery of Hon
Henry Yerger, assistant secretary of
state, who came upon 1t while inves-
tigating certain railroad land grants
at the request of the government
railroad administration. Being un-
able to find where the Gulf & ship
island Company had authority to
take over the land grant in question.
Mr.. Yerger made systematic search
of the statutes and found the one on
which this suit is based snugly hid
den away in the Acts of 1884, where
it has been sleeping all these years,
ignored by the railroad company and
forgotten by everyone else. This Act
is entitled "An Act to facilitate the
construction of the Gulf & Ship Is
land Railroad" 1t gave the company
the right to take over and use the
penitentiary and convicts of the state
in building its line, and also subro-
gated the company to all the rights
and privileges of the old Gulf & Ship
island Railroad, this subrogation car
rying the right to take over and use
the land grant, formerly given to the
old railroad. The Act then amends
the charter of the Gulf & Ship Island
Railroad Company, in consideration
of these benefits and concessions, so
as to require the company to give up
the route to Jackson as proposed in
It's charter of 1882, and required the
company to build its line on the sur
vey of the old company, in the fol-
lowing emphatic and specific Ian
guage;- THE Gulf & Ship Island
Railroad SHALL run the line of
said railroad from it's southern ter
minus along the line of the old sur
vey of the Gulf & Ship Island rail-
road, centrally through the state as
far as practicable to the town of Pom
totoc, Pontotoc County, Mississippi,
thence north, or northeast or north
west to the boundary line of the
state, or to the Tennessee river, as
may be determined by the Board of
Directors of said Company"
After locating this act and being
unable to find that the legislature
mad ever given the company author
ity to change this route, Mr.. Yerger
recognized its significance and took
Judge Stricken into his confidence to
develop the case. The matter was
then placed before Revenue Agent
Robertson who decided to bring the
suit.
While the bill seeks primarily to
hold the company liable for damage
for the alleged willful and fraudu-
lent violation of it's contract, it also
strongly suggests that the Chancery
Court should compel the railroad
company to proceed with the building
of the railroad it promised to build
and which the legislature said it
should build in consideration of the
great benefits conferred upon it; but
it is urged that the company should |
be required also to maintain its pres |
ent line to Jackson intact as being !
now necessary part of the commerce |
of the state.
The Revenue Agent points out in |
connection with the suit, that aside !
from the fact that the railroad COM
pany got the use and benefit of the
lands worth possibly three million |
dollars, and aside from the fact that |
it got the use of the penitentiary and |
conVicts for several years at saving |
of several hundred thousand dollars |
in labor costs the company also got |
charter from the State of Missis- |
sippi which possibly goes further in
the liberality of it's concessions than |
any charter ever granted to railroad |
in this country. Under this charter |
the road is allowed to charge the |
most exorbitant freight and passen- |
ger rates, and the Revenue Agent |
states, it has fattened on these ex-
cessive charges through all these |
years, in defiance of it's contract, and !
has snapped its fingers at the Rail-
road Commission which was power
less to interfere or to regulate it's |
rates.
AS the case is presented to the |
court the Chancellor may in his dis
cretion decree damages for breach of
contract and determine the amount !
of same, or he may require the COM !
pany under heavy damage penalties, |
to build the line in accordance with |
the Act of 1884. This latter would, |
however, the Revenue Agent claims, !
be but tardy justice to the people of |
central and north Mississippi, whose
development has been hindered and !
retarded during all these years by |
the bold and startling manner In |
which this railroad company has
treated a solemn statute of the state !.
as scrap of paper" jackson :
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