Source: https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/188/108
Timestamp: 2019-01-22 22:54:55
Document Index: 154513779

Matched Legal Cases: ['§ 3', '§ 6', '§ 3', '§ 3', '§ 6', '§ 3', '§ 4', '§ 6', '§ 3', '§ 6', '§ 2264', '§ 2290']

PETER NELSON and Henry Nelson, , v. NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY. | US Law | LII / Legal Information Institute
PETER NELSON and Henry Nelson, , v. NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY.
188 U.S. 108 (23 S.Ct. 302, 47 L.Ed. 406)
PETER NELSON and Henry Nelson, Plffs. in Err., v. NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILWAY COMPANY.
Argued: October 16, 17, 1902.
Decided: January 26, 1903.
dissent, Brewer, Brown, Shiras [HTML]
Syllabus from pages 108-110 intentionally omitted
The Northern Pacific Railway Company brought this action in one of the courts of the state of Washington to recover from the plaintiffs in error the southeast quarter of section twenty-seven, township twenty, north of range fourteen, east of the Willamette meridian, in Kittitas county, in that state,the company claiming to be the owner in fee, and alleging that the defendants were in unlawful possession of the land.
The company fixed the general route of its road extending coterminous with said land, and within 40 miles thereof, by filing a plat of such route with the Commissioner of the General Land Office August 20th, 1873. Thereafter, on November 1st, 1873, that officer transmitted to the register and receiver of the land office for the district in which the land was situate the following letter of instructions: 'Gentlemen:The Northern Pacific Railroad Company having filed in this department a map showing the general route of their branch line, from Puget sound to a connection with their main line near Lake Pend d'Oreille in Idaho territory, I have caused to be prepared a diagram which is herewith transmitted, showing the 40-mile limits of the land grant along said line, extending through your district, and you are hereby directed to withhold from sale or entry all the odd-numbered sections falling within these limits not already included in the withdrawal for the main-line period. The even sections are increased in price to $2.50 per acre, subject to pre-emption and homestead entry only. This withdrawal takes effect from August 15th, 1873, the date when the map was filed by the company with the Secretary of the Interior, as required by the 6th section of the act of July 2d, 1864, organizing said company.'
By the 3d section of that act, it was, among other things, provided as follows, to wit: 'That there be, and hereby is, granted to the 'Northern Pacific Railroad Company,' its successors and assigns, for the purpose of aiding in the construction of said railroad and telegraph line to the Pacific coast, and to secure the safe and speedy transportation of the mails, troops, munitions of war, and public stores over the route of said line of railway, every alternate section of public land, not mineral, designated by odd numbers, to the amount of twenty alternate sections per mile, on each side of said railroad line, as said company may adopt, through the territories of the United States, and ten alternate sections of land per mile on each side of said railroad whenever it passes through any state, and whenever on the line thereof the United States have full title, not reserved, sold, granted, or otherwise appropriated, and free from pre-emption or other claims or rights at the time the line of said road is definitely fixed, and a plat thereof filed in the office of the Commissioner of the General Land Office; and whenever, prior to said time of definite location, any of said sections or parts of sections shall have been granted, sold, reserved, occupied by homestead settlers, or pre-empted, or otherwise disposed of, other lands shall be selected by said company in licu thereof, under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior, in alternate sections, and designated by odd numbers, not more than 10 miles beyond the limits of said alternate sections. . . .'
By the 6th section of the act of July 2d, 1864, it was declared that the odd sections 'hereby granted,' that is, by that act granted, should not be liable to sale, entry, or pre-emption before or after they were surveyed, except by the company, as provided in the act. But we have also seen, looking at the 3d section, which was the granting section of the act, that Congress did not grant every odd-numbered alternate section within the general limits specified, but only the odd-numbered alternate sections to which the United States had full title, and which had not been previously reserved, sold, granted, or otherwise appropriated, and which were free from pre-emption or 'other claims or rights'at the time the line of the road was definitely fixedgiving to the railroad company the right to select lands, within certain limits, in place of such as were found, at the date of definite location, to have been disposed of or to be 'occupied by homestead settlers.'
The first inquiry is whether the railroad company acquired any vested interest in the land in dispute by reason merely of the acceptance by the Land Department of its map of general route, or by reason merely of the withdrawal order of 1873. In other words, Did the land, after the general route was established, become segregated from the public domain and cease to be a part of the public lands, so as not to be subject to occupancy, in good faith, by homestead settlers, prior to definite location? These questions have a direct bearing on the present issues; for, if Congress did not intendas, we think, it did notthat the railroad company should acquire any vested interest in these lands, prior to definite location, we can understand why it excluded from its grant any lands 'occupied by homestead settlers' at the time of the definite location of the road.
In Northern P. R. Co. v. Sanders, 166 U. S. 620, 634, 636, 41 L. ed. 1139, 1144, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 671, 676, it was adjudged that the railroad company 'acquired, by fixing its general route, only an inchoate right to the odd-numbered sections granted by Congress, and no right attached to any specific section until the road was definitely located and the map thereof filed and accepted. Until such definite location it was competent for Congress to dispose of the public lands of the general route of the road as it saw proper.' In the same case the court, after observing that as the lands there in dispute were not free from claims at the date of definite location, it was of no consequence what was done with them after date, proceeded: 'The only ground upon which a contrary view can be rested is the provision in the 6th section of the act of 1864, that 'the odd sections of land hereby granted shall not be liable to sale or entry or pre-emption before or after they are surveyed, except by said company, as provided by this act.' But this section is not to be construed without reference to other sections of the act. It must be taken in connection with § 3, which manifestly contemplated that rights of pre-emption or other claims and rights might accrue or become attached to the lands granted after the general route of the road was fixed and before the line of definite location was established. Literally interpreted, the words above quoted from § 6 would tie the hands of the government so that even it could not sell any of the odd-numbered sections of the lands after the general route was fixed,an interpretation wholly inadmissible in view of the provisions in the 3d section. The 3d and 6th sections must be taken together, and so taken it must be adjudged that nothing in the 6th section prevented the government from disposing of any of the lands prior to the fixing of the line of definite location, or, for the reasons stated, from receiving, under the existing statutes, applications to purchase such lands as mineral lands.' The principles announced in the Sanders Case were reaffirmed in Menotti v. Dillon, 167 U. S. 703, 720, 42 L. ed. 333, 338, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 945, 951, the court adding: 'It is true, as said in many cases, that the object of an executive order withdrawing from preemption, private entry, and sale, lands within the general route of a railroad, is to preserve the lands, unencumbered, until the completion and acceptance of the road. But where the grant was, as here, of odd-numbered sections, within certain exterior lines, 'not sold, reserved, or otherwise disposed of by the United States, and to which a preemption or homestead claim may not have attached, at the time the line of said road is definitely fixed,' the filing of a map of general route and the issuing of a withdrawal order did not prevent the United States, by legislation, at any time prior to the definite location of the road, from selling, reserving, or otherwise disposing of any of the lands which, but for such legislation, would have become, in virtue of such definite location, the property of the railroad company.'
In United States v. Oregon & C. R. Co. 176 U. S. 28, 43, 44 L. ed. 358, 364, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 261, 266, which involved the conflicting claims of two railroad companies to certain lands, and required the court to determine the effect of a map of general route filed by the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, as well as the extent of the grant made to it, the court said: 'If, therefore, the Perham map of 1865 were conceded for the purposes of the present discussion to have been sufficient as a map of 'general route,'and nothing more can possibly be claimed for it, these lands could not be regarded as having been brought by that map (even if it had been accepted) within the grant to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, and thereby have become so segregated from the public domain as to preclude the possibility of their being earned by other railroad companies under statutes enacted by Congress after the filing of that map and before any definite location by the company of its line.' In the same case: 'In opposition to the views we have expressed, it may be said that the clause in the act of July 25th, 1866 (14 Stat. at L. 239, chap. 242), providing for the selection under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior of lands for the Oregon company in lieu of any that should 'be found to have been granted, sold, reserved, occupied by homestead settlers, pre-empted, or otherwise disposed of,' shows that Congress did not intend to include in, but intended to exclude from, the grant to that company any lands that could have been earned by the Northern Pacific Railroad Company by definitely fixing its route and filing its map of definite location. Undoubtedly those lands would be regarded as having been appropriated when the route of the Oregon road was definitely located, if prior to that date the route of the Northern Pacific Railroad had been definitely fixed, and if such lands were within the exterior lines of that route. But, as we have said, these lands were within the limits of the grant of July 25th, 1866, and had not, at that time or when the route of the Oregon road was definitely located, been appropriated for the benefit of the Northern Pacific Railroad Company, for the reason that the latter company had not then filed any map of definite location. The Northern Pacific Railroad Company could take no lands except such as were unappropriated at the time its line was definitely fixed. It accepted the grant of 1864 subject to the possibility that Congress might, before its line was definitely fixed, authorize other railroad corporations to appropriate lands within its general route, allowing it to select other lands in lieu of any so appropriated. The lands here in dispute were consequently subject to be disposed of by Congress when the act of 1866 was passed; and (the line of the Northern Pacific railroad not having been definitely located prior to the passage of the forfeiture act of 1890 (26 Stat. at L. 496, chap. 1040, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 1598), the Oregon Company became entitled to take the lands and to receive patents therefor in virtue of its accepted map of definite location.' See also Wilcox v. Eastern Oregon Land Co. 176 U. S. 51, 44 L. ed. 368, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 269, and Messinger v. Eastern Oregon Land Co. 176 U. S. 58, 44 L. ed. 370, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 271.
This view protects the bona fide settler in his home, established upon the invitation of the government under great difficulties, and does no injustice to the railroad company; for, after restricting the grant to such odd-numbered sections of lands, within specified lateral limits, as were free from pre-emption or 'other claims or rights' at the time the line of the road was definitely fixed, Congress, in the act of 1864, as we have seen, proceeded: 'And whenever, prior to said time of definite location any of said sections or parts of sections shall have been granted, sold, reserved, occupied by homestead settlers, or pre-empted or otherwise disposed of, other lands shall be selected by said company in lieu thereof,' etc. The words 'occupied by homestead settlers' show that Congress intended by the charter of the Northern Pacific Railroad Companywhatever it may have intended as to other companies receiving grants of public landsthat occupancy by a homestead settler, with the intention to take the benefit of the homestead laws, constituted a claim which, existing at the date of definite location, would exclude from the grant land that might otherwise be covered by it. If Congress did not intend thus to protect the occupancy of homestead settlers, the reference to lands being 'occupied by homestead settlers,' at date of definite location, was meaningless, and it was useless to reserve to the company the privilege of selecting lands in lieu of those lost by such occupancy. Congress knew, when passing the act of 1864, that one going west to establish his home could not know whether the unsurveyed land occupied by him would be an even-numbered or odd-numbered section. Hence, the provision in § 3 in relation to odd-numbered sections 'occupied by homestead settlers.' The efficacy of such a provision could not be destroyed except by further legislation. It is as if Congress had in words declared that among the 'other claims or rights' of which the land must be free at the time of definite location in order that the railroad company might take, were claims arising out of occupancy by homestead settlers. Such settlers Congress, in effect, declared should be protected in their rights, and the railroad company should be reimbursed by lieu lands near by. Nelson's occupancy, we have seen, commenced in 1881, while the definite location of the road occurred in 1884. That he occupied and continuously resided upon the land in dispute as a homestead settler after 1881 is admitted.
In the recent case of Tarpey v. Madsen, 178 U. S. 215, 219, 44 L. ed. 1042, 1044, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 849, 850,which was a contest between the Central Pacific Railroad Company and a pre-emptor who sought to avail himself of the act of September, 1841,it was found as a fact that the land in dispute had on it, at the date of definite location (which was on October 20th, 1868), the improvements of a bona fide settler; and one of the questions in the case was how far the rights of the settler, based upon a bona fide occupancy, were affected by the absence of a local land office in which could be made some record of his application or entry. This court said: 'It is true that there was then no local land office in which those seeking to make pre-emption or homestead entries could file their declaratory statements or make entries, and the want of such an office is made by the supreme court of the state one of the main grounds for holding that the land did not pass to the railroad company. We agree with that court fully in its discussion of the general principles involved in the failure of the government to provide a local land office. The right of one who has actually occupied, with an intent to make a homestead or pre-emption entry, cannot be defeated by the mere lack of a place in which to make a record of his intent. . . . If Olney was in possession of this tract before October 20, 1868 date of definite location, with a view of entering it as a homestead or pre-emption claim, and was simply deprived of his ability to make his entry or declaratory statement by the lack of a local land office, he could, undoubtedly, when such office was established, have made his entry or declaratory statement in such way as to protect his rights.' In the present case, the settler waited from 1881 to 1893 for the land to be surveyed, and as soon as that was done he attempted to enter it under the homestead law in the proper office, but his claim was overruled upon the theory, unfounded in law, that the land was covered by the railroad grant.
The 3d section of this statute is a distinct confirmation of the rights of a qualified person who had theretofore settled or should thereafter settle 'on any of the public lands of the United States, whether surveyed or unsurveyed, with the intention of claiming the same under the homestead laws;' thought, of course, no lands could be deemed of that character which had prior to such settlement become vested in a railroad company in virtue of an accepted map of definite location. It is, as we have seen, a fixed principle in the law relating to the administration of the public lands that a railroad grant is a mere float until definite location, and that prior to that date all lands, within the exterior limits of a general route, are entirely at the disposal of the government, to be appropriated as it desires. The railroad company, as already shown, acquired, by its accepted map of general route, no interest in any specific lands, but only a right to take those to which, at the date of definite location, the United States had full title, and upon which there was no claim, and which were not 'occupied by homestead settlers.' It was, therefore, competent for the United States by the act of 1880which was four years prior to the definite location of the Northern Pacific railroadto give additional rights to those who had then settled or might thereafter in good faith settle upon any of the public lands. Some who have made comments on this act seem to overlook the broad language of § 3, and to forget that that section embraces, not only those who had theretofore, but those who might thereafter, settle on the public lands, whether surveyed or unsurveyed. Nelson settled on unsurveyed public land, in which the railroad company had no vested or specific interest, and the 3d section of the act of 1880 was purposeless if it did not allow him to perfect his title under the homestead laws, as soon as the land was surveyed.
In Southern P. R. Co. (Branch) v. Lopez (1884) 3 Land Dec. 130, 131, Secretary Teller said that the act of July 27th, 1866, 14 Stat. at L. 292, chap. 278, relating to the Southern Pacific Railroad Company, 'granted only such lands as were 'not reserved, sold, granted , or otherwise appropriated, and free from pre-emption or other claims or rights,' at date of definite location; and provided that 'whenever, prior to said time, any of said sections or parts of sections shall have been occupied by homestead settlers, pre-empted,' etc., lieu lands might be taken.' It will be observed that this was the language of the Northern Pacific act of 1864. The Secretary proceeded: 'Now a homestead entry, which must be made on surveyed lands, would be within the descriptive terms 'other claims' without doubt; but the question material to the case before me, wherein the land was not surveyed, is whether a homestead settlement on unsurveyed land, with a view to entering it when surveyed, is within said terms. I think it is. Construing together the granting words and those respecting the lieu land selection, it is evident that one of the 'other claims or rights' excepting land from the operation of the grant was 'occupation occupied by homestead settlers.' The word 'occupied' and the idea conveyed by it were foreign to the homestead law at date of this act, as an essential element in the reservation of land. I need not recite the numerous decisions of the courts and of the Land Department, which settle the principle that under the homestead law it is the 'entry' which reserves land (except for the short period during which it is reserved by settlement under the act of May 14th, 1880), and not any occupation by the claimant before or after it. The language of the granting act is therefore peculiar in this respect, and we are to suppose that it was used deliberately, with knowledge of thenexisting law, and for a special and important purpose. We must interpret it in accordance with this evident purpose. Congress was aware that by this act it was making grants of land far beyond the line of the government surveys, in regions occupied and to be occupied largely by settlers awaiting the advent of the surveyor to prefer their claims. By § 6 the homestead law was extended to the even sections after survey, and expressly withheld from the odd sections before and after survey, and yet in § 3 land 'occupied by homestead settlers' was excepted from the grant. Congress knew that unsurveyed land could not be 'entered' as homesteads; it had in terms prohibited homestead 'entry' on these lands; it was aware that only by such 'entry' could a claim be appropriated and reserved from the grant, without express exception; and therefore in the use of the words 'occupied by homestead settlers' it intended to make such express exception, and to indicate a different kind of appropriation by a class of seltlers not within the letter of the homestead law, though clearly within its spirit, namely, those who had made a home on the public domain in advance of the surveys, with the intention of subsequently claiming it under said law. If this was not the purpose, then the employment of the peculiar language referred to was a vain and useless thing; and such a thing we are not to suppose Congress had done (92 U. S. 733, 23 L. ed. 634). It therefore follows that the land claimed by Lopez, whose proofs are not questioned in any particular, and who preferred his claim promptly upon survey, was 'occupied by a homestead settler' when the grant to this company took effect, and hence excepted from the operation of the grant.'
In Wood v. Beachwhich was a contest between a homestead settler and a railway companyit appeared that the map of the line of definite location was filed December 6th, 1866, and a withdrawal followed in 1867, while the occupation and settlement of the homesteader did not commence until June 8th, 1870. Of course, the legal title to the sections granted vested in the railway company upon the filing and acceptance of the map of definite location. Besides the withdrawal in 1867 was pursuant to the express command of the act of Congress of July 26th, 1866, 14 Stat. at L. 290, chap. 270, § 4, which provided that as soon as the railway company should 'file with the Secretary of the Interior maps of its line, designating the route thereof, it shall be the duty of said Secretary to withdraw from the market the lands granted by this act in such manner as may be best calculated to effect the purposes of this act and subserve the public interest.' It might well be, therefore, that one whose right, resting upon occupancy, had accrued, as in Maddox v. Burnham, after the legal title passed to the railroad company, or one who, as in Beach v. Wood, did not settle upon the public lands until after the railroad company had definitely located its road, and after the lands had been withdrawn from market pursuant to the directions of an express act of Congress, could not, as against the railroad company, acquire an interest in them by virtue of the act of 1880.
At the time of the passage of the act the entire body of the country from the western boundary of Minnesota to the Cascade Range was unoccupied, untraveled, and almost wholly unexplored. As said by Senator Hendricks, when the bill was before the Senate: 'Everybody can see at a glance that it is a work of national importance. It proposes to grant lands in a northern latitude where, without the construction of a work like that, the lands are comparatively without value to the government. No person acquainted with the condition of that section of country supposes that there can be very extensive settlements until the government shall encourage those settlements by the construction of some work like this.' And by Senator Harlan, the chairman of the Committee on Public Lands: 'The Committee on Public Lands agree to report this bill favorably on account of the vast consequence that will attach to the completion of the road. The land is to be conveyed to the company only as the road progresses. The committee were of opinion that if the road should be built the government could well afford to give one half the land, for the distance of 40 miles on each side of the road, to secure its completion. If it should not be built, no lands will have been conveyed.' In other words, the proposition was to give half of the lands within 40 miles of the road to the company,not to give as much land as would be equal to half the lands within 40 miles of the road, but to give half of those lands. The difference is obvious. The construction of a railroad increases the value of contiguous lands. Congress doubles the price of the even-numbered sections which it retains. It makes no little difference to a company whether it receives lands along the line of the road which it constructs, lands which have been increased in value by reason thereof, or an equal amount of lands hundreds of miles away and not so increased in value.
Further, the Land Department did in fact withdraw from sale or entry all the odd-numbered sections within the 40-mile limits of the general route,and this withdrawal included the tract in controversy as well as the other odd-numbered sections,and notice thereof was filed in the local land office, and this many years before the plaintiff in error went upon the land. As heretofore stated, the power of the Land Department to withdraw from private entry lands which it has reason to believe may be necessary to satisfy a land grant has never been denied. It is a power which has been exercised again and again from the inception of land grants. In one case (Wolcott v. Des Moines Nav. & R. Co. 5 Wall. 681, 18 L. ed. 689), we sustained a withdrawal made by the department beyond the real terminus of the grant on the ground that there was some doubt where the grant terminated, and therefore the department was justified in making the withdrawal coverany possible conclusion as to such terminus. There was in the Northern Pacific act no prohibition on the Land Department's exercise of this customary power. Indeed, as I have shown, it was held in Hewitt v. Schultz, 180 U. S. 139, 45 L. ed. 463, 21 Sup. Ct. Rep. 309, that the express direction to withdraw lands in the place limits was the foundation of an implied prohibition on a withdrawal of lands within the indemnity limits. The purpose and effect of a withdrawal are not to vest any title in the beneficiary of the grant, but to preserve the lands from private entry in order that when the time arrives the grantee may receive the full measure of its grant. As said in Menotti v. Dillon, 167 U. S. 703, 720, 721, 42 L. ed. 333, 339, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 945, 951:
'In the case of Riley v. Welles 154 U. S. 578 and 19 L. ed. 648, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1166, referred to and quoted in the Shire Case 10 Land Dec. 85, it was said by the Supreme Court that settlement upon and possession of land within the limits of an executive withdrawal were 'without right,' and that the subsequent recognition by the land officers of such settlement and possession, and the permission to the party to make proof and entry under the pre-emption law, and the issuing patent 'were acts in violation of law and void.' This case of Riley v. Welles has never been overruled or modified, but has been referred to and approved in a number of the decisions of the Supreme Court, and must therefore be accepted as expressing the opinion of that tribunal as to the absolute invalidity of settlements upon lands withdrawn by executive order.'
'It was admitted at the hearing that the construction of the Northern Pacific act of 1864 announced by Secretary Vilas had been adhered to in the administration of the public lands by the Land Department. We are now asked to overthrow that construction by holding that it was competent for the Land Department, immediately upon the definite location of the line of the railroad, to withdraw draw from the settlement laws all the odd-numbered sections within the indemnity limits as defined by the act of Congress. If this were done it is to be apprehended that great, if not endless, confusion would ensue in the administration of the public lands, and that the rights of a vast number of people who have acquired homes under the preemption and homestead laws, in reliance upon the ruling of Secretary Vilas and his successors in office, would be destroyed.' Now we have a case in which the ruling of the department has been unchanged from the commencement to the present time,a ruling which Secretary Vilas in 7 Land Dec. supra, called 'so manifest a proposition,' and it is wholly disregarded. The recent and temporary ruling of the Land Department was in the former case sustained in order, as was said, to protect the settler. Here the continuous practice of the department is disregarded, and the patent issued by it to the railroad company is overthrown.
In the opinion of the majority some later cases are referred to which are said to qualify the decision in Buttz v. Northern P. R. Co. But even the slightest attention to what was decided in those cases shows that in no manner do they qualify or limit that decision so far as it affects the present question. Before noticing those cases it is well to consider what was the purpose and effect of § 6. It was not a granting section. It did not purport to give title to anything to the company. Its whole scope and effect was to withdraw from sale, entry, or pre-emption the odd-numbered sections in order that when the company filed its map of definite location it might secure those odd-numbered sections. The grant was made only by § 3 and attached to particular lands when the map of definite location was filed, but the proposition laid down in the Buttz Caseand the proposition I am contending for hereis that this plaintiff in error could acquire nothing by his entry upon an odd-numbered section after the filing of the map of general route and the withdrawal; that the tract was therefore free from a claim of any kind when the map of definite location was filed, and so there was nothing to prevent the railroad company from receiving title.
Now the cases referred to are St. Paul & P. R. Co. v. Northern P. R. Co. 139 U. S. 1, 35 L. ed. 77, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 389; United States v. Northern P. R. Co. 152 U. S. 284, 38 L. ed. 443, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 598; Northern P. R. Co. v. Sanders, 166 U. S. 620, 41 L. ed. 1139, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 671; Menotti v. Dillon, 167 U. S. 703, 42 L. ed. 333, 17 Sup. Ct. Rep. 945; United States v. Oregon & C. R. Co. 176 U. S. 28, 44 L. ed. 358, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 261; Wilcox v. Eastern Oregon Land Co. 176 U. S. 551, 44 L. ed. 368, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 269, and Messinger v. Eastern Oregon Land Co. 176 U. S. 58, 44 L. ed. 370, 20 Sup. Ct. Rep. 271. After quoting from the opinions in some,the court sums up by saying: 'The cases above cited definitely determine that the railroad company acquired no vested interest in any particular section of land until after a definite location was shown by an accepted map of its line.' This is a proposition among the A, B, C's of public land law and needed no authorities in support thereof. But that proposition throws no light on the question as to the scope of the withdrawal given by § 6, and when the cases themselves are referred to not one of them conflicts with the proposition I have heretofore laid down. I have already shown what was decided in St. Paul & P. R. Co. v. Northern P. R. Co. and need not repeat. In United States v. Northern P. R. Co. it appeared that the Northern Pacific Railroad Company had attempted to locate a line from Portland directly north to Puget sound, and in 1865 had filed a map of the general route thereof. Such a line was not within the authority granted by the act of Congress incorporating the Northern Pacific Railroad Company. On May 4, 1870, Congress made a land grant to the Oregon Central Railroad Company which included some of the lands within the 40-mile limits of the above-mentioned general route. On May 31, 1870, and twentyseven days after the grant to the Oregon Central Railroad Company, Congress passed an act which authorized the Northern Pacific company to construct a line from Portland to Puget sound, with the privileges and grants provided for in the original act of incorporation, and it was held that the rights of the Oregon Central Railroad Company antedated and were superior to those of the Northern Pacific. First in time, first in right, is as to lands within place limits the settled rule of railroad land grants. What possible bearing this decision can have upon the case before us it is hard to conceive. In Northern P. R. Co. v. Sanders the lands in controversy were claimed as mineral lands, and applications for entry of them as such were pending in the Land Department. The court had held in Barden v. Northern P. R. Co. 154 U. S. 288, 38 L. ed. 992, 14 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1030, that mineral lands did not pass under the grant to the railroad company, and that whether they were known or not known to be mineral lands at the time of the filing of the map of definite location was immaterial. Of course, it followed that whether they were known or not known at the time of the filing of the map of the general route was also immaterial. The lands were of such a character as could not in any event pass to the railroad company any more than the evennumbered sections. They were not with drawn by filing the map of general route; they did not pass by filing the map of definite location. The four remaining cases all proceeded upon the one proposition that the mere filing of the map of general route does not preclude Congress from making subsequently thereto and prior to the filing of the map of definite locationthat is, prior to the time when title vested in the companyany other specific grant of the reserved lands. In other words, until the proposed grantee shall have done all that is necessary to vest title in it, there remains in Congress the power to make other disposition of the lands. But this was no new doctrine in the public land law. It was laid down in Firsbie v. Whitney, 9 Wall. 187, 19 L. ed. 668; in the well-known Yosemite Valley Case, 15 Wall. 77, sub nom. Hutchings v. Low, 21 L. ed. 82; and has been followed in many cases since. Of course, Congress could, at any time before the filing of the map of definite location and while the title of the company was still inchoate, reserve any of the lands for military or other purposes, or make a specific grant of them to individuals or corporations. But, as said in St. Paul & P. R. Co. v. Northern P. R. Co. 139 U. S. 1, 35 L. ed. 77, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 389, 'after such withdrawal no interest in the lands granted can be acquired against the rights of the company, except by special legislative declaration,' and in this case there has been no such legislative declaration.
But it is said that the case of the plaintiff in error is 'placed on impregnable ground by the act of May 14, 1880 (chap. 89 21 Stat. at L. 140, U. S. Comp. Stat. 1901, p. 1392).' I pass the proposition that this is a general act for the relief of settlers on public lands and the familiar doctrine that a general law passed after a special act does not interfere with the provisions of that act, provided there is room for the operation of both, and there is ample room for the operation of this act on public lands generally without interfering with the special provisions made in the Northern Pacific grant. But the act itself has no force whatever as applied to the present question. The provision is that one who is a settler on any of the public lands of the United States 'with the intention of claiming the same under the homestead laws, shall be allowed the same time to file his homestead application and perfect his original entry in the United States land office as is now allowed to settlers under the preemption laws to put their claims on record, and his right shall relate back to the date of settlement, the same as if he had settled under the pre-emption laws.' If we turn to the pre-emption law we find (Rev. Stat. § 2264) that a person intending to preempt shall, 'within thirty days after the date of such settlement, file with the register of the proper district a written statement.' That is, the pre-emptioner had thirty days after settlement within which to make his entry, while when we turn to the homestead law (Rev. Stat. § 2290) 1 we find that a party seeking to homestead 'shall, upon application to the register of the land office in which he is about to make such entry, make affidavit . . . that his entry is made for the purpose of actual settlement and cultivation.' In other words, his right is initiated by the application to enter, and does not relate back to any settlement, and this statute simply gives him a right of thirty days' occupancy before making his application to enter. How such a statute, equalizing the rights of one seeking to make a homestead entry with those of one seeking to make pre-emption, can have any pertinency to the question before us, passes my comprehension.