should be a vote of the inhabitants of the town or city authorizing them. It is competent for the legislature to bestow the power directly on the corporation without any intermediary, as they did in this case." In Marshall v. Silliman, 61 Ill. 218, 225, the right of the legislature to grant such an authority to the trustees of an incorporated town was conceded. And in Williams v. Town of Roberts, 88 id. 11, 21, the court, speaking by Scholfield, C. J., said: "County boards, such as boards of supervisors, county commissioners, &c., and the municipal authorities of incorporated cities, towns, and villages, may, when empowered so to do by proper legislation, subscribe for the capital stock of railroad corporations without first submitting the question to the electors of the municipality. They are elected as representatives of the electors, and theoretically, in appropriate cases, their acts are the acts of those they represent. Hence it has been held, where a vote of the electors has been required as a precedent condition to the making of a subscription for stock in a railroad company, and the law prescribing the mode of calling and holding the election has not been observed, inasmuch as the legislature might have empowered the municipal authorities to make the subscription without first submitting the question to the electors, it may, by a subsequent enactment, declare the noncompliance with the law in the holding of the election of no consequence, and validate the subscription, in other words, validate the subscription without reference to the election. This, however, it will be observed, is upon the theory that power to make the subscription does not in any degree necessarily depend upon a vote of the electors of the municipality upon that question, but solely upon the will of the legislature.'

The authorities to which we have referred sustain the judgment against the city. This case is clearly distinguishable from those in which the legislature has attempted to impose upon a municipal corporation, without the consent of its corporate authorities, an indebtedness for subscription to the capital stock of a railroad corporation.

The cases mainly relied on by counsel for the city are those in which certain officers of limited authority were, in terms or in effect, required by legislative enactment to issue bonds or incur indebtedness in the name of a municipality, without the

consent, expressed in legal form, of those who were, in the constitutional sense, its corporate authorities. Here there can be no question but that the city council are the corporate authorities of Quincy. And there is no ground whatever upon which to rest the suggestion that the indebtedness was created without their consent. In no just sense were they compelled to issue bonds in exchange for stock in the railroad company. If, as claimed by the city, the act of March 27, 1869, was inoperative in so far as it assumed to legalize and confirm what had been previously done without the sanction of law, nevertheless by that act it was intended to confer upon the city council power, in execution of the expressed will of the voters, to issue bonds to the amount of $100,000 for stock in this railroad company. The vote of the electors, we have seen, was not essential to the validity of bonds issued, under legislative sanction, by the corporate authorities of the city. The city council was not required or directed, but only empowered to proceed as if they had been originally invested with authority to make the subscription. The legislature, in substance, declared, as it might constitutionally have done, that the corporate authorities of the city had its consent to issue bonds to be exchanged for stock in the railroad company. If the corporate authorities could have been compelled by legal proceedings to issue the bonds, that is only another form of saying that the curative act was constitutional, and, consequently, that the bonds are valid. If, however, they could not have been so compelled, then the execution and delivery of the bonds, under the authority of the act of March 27, 1869, was a voluntary creation of indebtedness for a corporate purpose by the corporate authorities of the city.

What has been said disposes of all the questions certified, including that one relating to the coupon of a bond delivered to the railroad company after the Constitution of 1870 went into effect. In Q. M. & P. R. R. Co. v. Morris all the bonds there involved were executed and issued under an act passed in 1871. They were sustained upon the ground that the validity of that act depended upon the power which the legislature possessed under the Constitution of 1848. That decision, it would seem, determines the present case as to the coupon of the bond delivered in November, 1870.

Judgment affirmed.

MILLS COUNTY v. RAILROAD COMPANIES.

1. The swamp and overflowed lands granted by the act of Sept. 28, 1850, c. 84, are subject to the disposal of the States wherein they respectively lie, and no party other than the United States can question such disposal or enforce the conditions of the grant.

2. The proviso to the second section of the act, that the proceeds of the lands shall be applied exclusively, as far as necessary, to the purpose of reclaiming the same by levees and drains, imposed an obligation which rests upon the good faith of the States. No trust was thereby attached to the lands, and the title to them, which is derived from either of the States, is not affected by the manner in which she performed that obligation. 3. The State of Iowa having granted its swamp and overflowed lands to the counties respectively in which they are situate, Mills County, insisting that certain lands were of this character, made claim thereto. The Burlington and Missouri River Railroad Company claimed them under the act of May 15, 1856, c. 28. These conflicting claims gave rise to a suit between the parties, which was decided by the State courts in favor of the county. A writ of error was thereupon brought; and, whilst it was pending here, a compromise was entered into by which the county was to make certain conveyances to the company, and to pay it the sum of $10,000 for lands previously disposed of. Conveyances were executed accordingly. Afterwards, the county instituted suit to have the compromise declared void, and the company sued for the $10,000. The State courts having sustained the compromise, and decided against the county in both suits, writs of error were brought here. Held, 1. That the county cannot set up that the lands were disposed of contrary to the provisions of the said act of 1850. 2. That although, after the compromise was made, the writ then pending was submitted to this court, and decided in favor of the county, yet that this did not abrogate the compromise, as the parties continued to act under it; and that the decision of the State court in the present cases is not repugnant to, nor in disaffirmance of, the opinion and judgment of this

court.

ERROR to the Supreme Court of the State of Iowa.

The case is stated in the opinion of the court.

Mr. Charles B. Lawrence and Mr. D. H. Solomon for the plaintiff in error.

Mr. Samuel Shellabarger and Mr. Jeremiah M. Wilson for the defendant in error.

MR. JUSTICE BRADLEY delivered the opinion of the court. These cases were consolidated and heard together in the State courts, both relating to the same subject-matter; viz., the

validity of a compromise agreement made on the 27th of October, 1868, between Mills County, in the State of Iowa, and the Burlington and Missouri River Railroad Company, in reference to certain lands lying in said county, claimed by the county as swamp and overflowed lands, and claimed by the railroad company as railroad-grant lands. The claim of the county was based on the act of Congress of Sept. 28, 1850, c. 84, entitled "An Act to enable the State of Arkansas and other States to reclaim the swamp lands within their limits;" and an act of the General Assembly of the State of Iowa, entitled "An Act to dispose of the swamp and overflowed lands in the State of Iowa, and to pay the expenses of selecting and surveying the same," approved Jan. 13, 1853; and other acts of the General Assembly of said State. The claim of the railroad company was based upon the act of Congress of May 15, 1856, c. 28, granting to the State of Iowa certain lands for the purpose of aiding the building of a railroad from Burlington, Iowa, to a point on the Missouri River at or near the mouth of Platte River in Nebraska.

The act of Congress first referred to declares, in effect, that to enable the State of Iowa to construct the necessary levees and drains to reclaim the swamp and overflowed lands therein, the whole of those swamp and overflowed lands, made unfit thereby for cultivation, which shall remain unsold at the passage of the act, shall be, and the same are hereby, granted to said State.

And, after providing for listing and patenting the lands, it was, by sect. 2, enacted that the fee-simple to said lands shall vest in the State of Iowa, subject to the disposal of the legislature thereof: "Provided, however, that the proceeds of said lands, whether from sale or direct appropriation in kind, shall be applied exclusively, as far as necessary, to the purpose of reclaiming said lands, by means of the levees and drains aforesaid."

The General Assembly of Iowa, by an act passed Jan. 13, 1853, declared "that all swamp and overflowed lands granted to the State of Iowa by the act of Congress (September 28, 1850) be, and the same are hereby, granted to the counties

respectively in which the same may lie or be situated, for the purpose of constructing the necessary levees and drains to reclaim the same; and the balance of said lands, if any there be, after the same are reclaimed as aforesaid, shall be applied to the building of roads and bridges, when necessary, through or across said lands, and if not needed for this purpose, to be expended in building roads and bridges within the county."

On the 22d of March, 1858, the General Assembly passed another act, containing, amongst others, the following provisions:

1. "Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the State of Iowa, That it shall be competent and lawful for the counties owning swamp and overflowed lands to devote the same, or the proceeds thereof, either in whole or in part, to the erection of public buildings for the purpose of education, the building of bridges, roads, and highways; for building institutions of learning, or for making railroads through the county or counties to whom such lands belong: Provided, that before any of said land, or the proceeds thereof, shall be so devoted to any of the purposes aforesaid, the question whether the same shall be so done shall be submitted, at some general or special election, to the people of the county.

2. "The proper officer or officers of any county may contract with any person or company for the transfer and conveyance of said swamp or overflowed lands, or the proceeds thereof, or otherwise appropriate the same to such person or company, or to their use, for the purpose of aiding or carrying out any of the objects mentioned in the first section of this act, which said contract shall be reduced to writing and signed by the respective parties or their lawful authorized agents."

Another section prescribed the mode in which elections should be called and held, and without which any contract should be void, and concluded with the following proviso: "Provided, that no sale, contract, or other disposition of said swamp or overflowed lands shall be valid, unless the person or company to whom the same are sold, contracted, or otherwise disposed of, shall take the same subject to all the provisions of the acts of Congress of September 28, 1850, and shall expressly release the State of Iowa and the county in which the lands are situated, from all liability for reclaiming said land."