Source: https://www.legalcrystal.com/case/87497/reagan-vs-farmers-loan-trust-co
Timestamp: 2019-04-20 17:19:14+00:00

Document:
Respondent Farmers' Loan and Trust Co.
"The first class is where the suit is brought against the officers of the state, as representing the state's action and liability, and thus making it, though not a party to the record, the real party against which the judgment will so operate as to compel it to specifically perform its contracts. In re Ayers, 123 U. S. 443 ; Louisiana v. Junel, 107 U. S. 711 ; Antoni v. Greenhow, 107 U. S. 769 ; Cunningham v. Macon & Brunswick Railroad, 109 U. S. 446 ; Hagood v. Southern, 117 U. S. 52 ."
"The other class is where a suit is brought against defendants who, claiming to act as officers of the state and under the color of an unconstitutional statute, commit acts of wrong and injury to the rights and property of the plaintiff acquired under a contract with the state. Such suit, whether brought to recover money or property in the hands of such defendants, unlawfully taken by them in behalf of the state, or for compensation in damages, or, in a proper case where the remedy at law is inadequate, for an injunction to prevent such wrong and injury, or for a mandamus, in a like case, to enforce upon the defendant the performance of a plain, legal duty, purely ministerial, is not, within the meaning of the Eleventh Amendment, an action against the state. Osborn v. Bank of the United States, 9 Wheat. 738; Davis v. Gray, 16 Wall. 203; Tomlinson v. Branch, 15 Wall. 460; Litchfield v. Webster County, 101 U. S. 773 ; Allen v. Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, 114 U. S. 311 ; Board of Liquidation v. McComb, 92 U. S. 531 ; Poindexter v. Greenhow, 114 U. S. 270 . "
"In these cases, he is not sued as, or because he is, the officer of the government, but as an individual, and the court is not ousted of jurisdiction because he asserts authority as such officer. To make out his defense, he must show that his authority was sufficient in law to protect him. See Mitchell v. Harmony, 13 How. 115; Bates v. Clark, 95 U. S. 204 ; Meigs v. McClung, 9 Cranch 11; Wilcox v. Jackson, 13 Pet. 498; Brown v. Huger, 21 How. 305; Grisar v. McDowell, 6 Wall. 364."
Nor can it be said in such a case that relief is obtainable only in the courts of the state, for it may be laid down as a general proposition that whenever a citizen of a state can go into the courts of the state to defend his property against the illegal acts of its officers, a citizen of another state may invoke the jurisdiction of the federal courts to maintain a like defense. A state cannot tie up a citizen of another state, having property rights within its territory invaded by unauthorized acts of its own officers, to suits for redress in its own courts. Given a case where a suit can be maintained in the courts of the state to protect property rights, a citizen of another state may invoke the jurisdiction of the federal courts. Cowles v. Mercer County, 7 Wall. 118; Lincoln County v. Luning, 133 U. S. 529 ; Chicot County v. Sherwood, 148 U. S. 529 .
the fares and freights which may be charged and received by railroad or other carriers, and that this regulation can be carried on by means of a commission. Such a commission is merely an administrative board created by the state for carrying into effect the will of the state, as expressed by its legislation. Railroad Commission Cases, 116 U. S. 307 . No valid objection therefore can be made on account of the general features of this act, those by which the state has created the railroad commission and entrusted it with the duty of prescribing rates of fares and freights as well as other regulations for the management of the railroads of the state.
Budd v. New York, 143 U. S. 517 , announces nothing to the contrary. The question there was not whether the rates were reasonable, but whether the business, that of elevating grain, was within legislative control as to the matter of rates. It was said in the opinion: "In the cases before us, the records do not show that the charges fixed by the statute are unreasonable." Hence there was no occasion for saying anything as to the power or duty of the courts in case the rates, as established, had been found to be unreasonable. It was enough that upon examination it appeared that there was no evidence upon which it could be adjudged that the rates were in fact open to objection on that ground.
of handling, etc. It is recognized in the management of all railroads, and no complaint is here made of the fact of classification, or the way in which it was made by the commission. By these circulars, rates all along the line of classification were reduced from those theretofore charged on the road. The challenge in this case is of the tariff as a whole, and not of any particular rate upon any single class of goods. As we have seen, it is not the function of the courts to establish a schedule of rates. It is not, therefore, within out power to prepare a new schedule or rearrange this. Our inquiry is limited to the effect of the tariff as a whole, including therein the rates prescribed for all the several classes of goods, and the decree must either condemn or sustain this act of quasi -legislation. If a law be adjudged invalid, the court may not, in the decree, attempt to enact a law upon the same subject which shall be obnoxious to no legal objections. It stops with simply passing its judgment on the validity of the act before it. The same rule obtains in a case like this.

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