1. A bill designated as "House Bill No. 231," and having for its
title, "An Act to amend an act entitled
An Act to incorporate
the Illinois Grand Trunk Railway,'" regularly passed the House of
Representatives of the General Assembly of Illinois. In its passage
through the Senate, "Illinois" was dropped from the title, and in
the message of the House to the Senate and of the Senate to the
House, reporting its passage by those bodies respectively,
"Illinois" was left out of the title, but the designation as House
Bill, No. 231 was retained. The journals show no amendment to the
title. The bill as above entitled was signed by the presiding
officer of each House. The Constitution of Illinois then in force
provides that
"Every bill shall be read on three different days in each House,
. . . and every bill having passed both Houses shall be signed by
the speakers of their respective Houses."
Held that the act was duly and constitutionally
passed.
2. The word "inhabitants," where it occurs in the first section
of the act, means legal voters.
3. After the voters of a town have, at an election held pursuant
to that act, voted in favor of a donation to aid in the
construction of a railroad, the supervisor and clerk are the proper
authorities to subscribe for the stock of the railroad company and
issue the bonds of the township therefor.
4. A
bona fide holder of the bonds is not bound to look
beyond their recitals and the legislative enactment under which
they were issued.
5. The fact that the coupons are made payable at a particular
place does not make it necessary to aver or prove a presentation of
them for payment there.
6. Coupons bear interest from their maturity, and, when severed
from the bonds, are negotiable, and pass by delivery.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the Court.
MR. JUSTICE WOODS delivered the opinion of the Court.
This suit was brought upon one thousand and ten coupons for ten
dollars each, representing the annual interest on three hundred and
twenty-one bonds for the sum of one hundred dollars each,
purporting to be executed by the township of Walnut. It was claimed
that the bonds were issued in aid of the
Page 103 U. S. 684
Illinois Grand Trunk Railway Company, and in payment of stock in
that company subscribed for by the plaintiff in error and delivered
to it.
The coupons bore the following numbers: from 1 to 200 inclusive,
258, and from 281 to 400 inclusive, and were cut from bonds bearing
corresponding numbers.
Before final judgment in the court below, the defendant in error
took a nonsuit as to all coupons sued on bearing numbers from 301
to 400 inclusive, and withdrew the same from consideration by the
court, and left, as the cause of action, only those coupons which
bore numbers under 301.
The declaration set out a copy of one of the coupons sued on and
averred that all the others were of the same tenor and effect
except as to their numbers and date of payment respectively. The
copy was as follows:
"
No. 251. Series 4, due January 1, 1875, for $10"
"
$10] WALNUT TOWNSHIP [No. 251"
"
Railroad Bond"
"
I
nterest Warrant"
"Supervisor of Walnut Township pay to bearer, January 1, 1875,
ten dollars, at the office of the State Treasurer, Springfield,
Illinois."
"WM. SANDERS,
Town Clerk"
"M. KNIGHT,
Supervisor"
The parties waived a trial by jury and submitted the cause to
the court upon the issues of fact as well as of law. The court made
a special finding of facts, as follows:
"
First, that said defendant town, by its town clerk and
supervisor, did, some time in the month of October, A.D. 1870, make
its four hundred bonds for the sum of one hundred dollars each, and
numbered consecutively from one to four hundred, inclusive,
amounting in the aggregate to the sum of forty thousand dollars,
said bonds bearing interest at the rate of ten percent per annum,
payable annually, and the principal thereof payable to the Illinois
Grand Trunk Railway or bearer on the first day of January, A.D.
1881, and dated January 1, 1871, said interest being evidenced by
ten interest warrants or coupons
Page 103 U. S. 685
for ten dollars each, payable to bearer and attached to said
bonds, as set out in the declaration in this case. That said bonds
recited on their face that they were issued to said Illinois Grand
Trunk Railway by authority of an act of the Legislature of the
State of Illinois, approved March 25, 1869, entitled "An Act to
amend an act entitled
An Act to incorporate the Illinois Grand
Trunk Railway,'" and "in pursuance of a vote of the people of said
town, had and taken June 25, 1870," being the same bonds described
in plaintiff's declaration. That the coupons described in said
declaration were cut from the first three hundred of said bonds,
and are all due and unpaid."
"
Second, that at some time in the month of January,
A.D. 1871, the supervisor and town clerk of said town, acting for
and in behalf of said town, subscribed for forty thousand dollars
of the capital stock of said Illinois Grand Trunk Railway, and
issued and delivered said four hundred bonds to said railway in
payment of said subscription, and that within ten or fifteen days
therefrom the said railway corporation sold said bonds for value,
and applied the proceeds to the construction of its railroad
through said town; and that said plaintiff, on the ___ day of
September, A. D. 1871, bought the bonds from which the coupons sued
on were detached, and also all the coupons thereto attached and
unpaid, in good faith, in the New York market, and paid therefor in
money at the rate of ninety-two and one-half cents on the dollar,
without actual notice of any defense whatever against said bonds or
coupons."
"
Third, that the said Act of the Legislature of the
State of Illinois, approved March 25, 1869, entitled 'An Act to
amend an act to incorporate the Illinois Grand Trunk Railway,' was
duly and constitutionally passed by the General Assembly of said
State of Illinois."
"
Fourth, that the voters of said town, at an election
duly called and held in said town, pursuant to the provisions of
said act, on the twenty-fifth day of June, 1870, voted that said
town would subscribe for thirty thousand dollars of the capital
stock of said railway, and in payment therefor issue the bonds of
said town for the amount of said stock, bearing ten percent
interest annually, and the principal sum payable in ten years from
their date. "
Page 103 U. S. 686
"That on the sixth day of August, 1870, at another election
called and held in pursuance of the requirements of said act, the
electors of said town voted to subscribe for ten thousand dollars
of the capital stock of said railway in addition to the thirty
thousand dollars voted on the twenty-fifth day of June, 1870, to be
paid for in bonds of said town, bearing the same rate of interest
and payable at the same time as the bonds to be issued for said
thirty thousand dollars subscription."
"
Fifth, that the coupons offered in evidence and upon
which judgment is rendered in this case were cut from bonds of said
issue numbered from one to three hundred."
Besides this special finding the record contained a bill of
exceptions which embodied all the evidence submitted by both
parties in the case.
Upon the special finding the court rendered judgment for the
plaintiff below for the principal sum due on the coupons, and for
interest thereon from the date when they were payable
respectively.
The alleged act of the legislature, by authority of which it was
claimed the bonds were issued, is as follows:
"An Act to amend an act entitled 'An Act to incorporate the
Illinois Grand Trunk Railway.'"
"SECTION 1. Be it enacted by the people of the State of
Illinois, represented in the General Assembly, that any city,
incorporated town, or township which may be situated on or near the
route of the Illinois Grand Trunk railway, west of the City of
Mendota, via Prophetstown, to the Mississippi River, may become
subscribers to the stock of said railway, and may issue bonds for
the amount of such stock so subscribed, with coupons for interest
thereto attached, under such limitations and restrictions and on
such conditions as they may choose, and the directors of said
company may approve the proposition for said subscription, having
been first submitted to the inhabitants of such city, town, or
township, and approved by them; and upon application of any ten
voters of any city, town, or township, as aforesaid, specifying the
amount to be subscribed, and the conditions of such subscription,
it shall be the duty of the clerk of such city, town, or township
immediately to call an election, in the same manner that other
elections for said city, town, or township are called, for the
purpose of determining whether said city, town, or township will
subscribe to the stock of said railway; and if a majority
Page 103 U. S. 687
of said votes shall be 'for subscription,' then the corporate
authorities of said city, town, or township, and the supervisor and
town clerk of said township so voting, shall cause said
subscription to be made; and upon its acceptance by the directors
of said company, shall cause bonds to be issued in conformity with
said vote, which bonds shall not be of less denomination than one
hundred dollars, and in no case bear a higher rate of interest than
ten percent, provided no such election shall be held until at least
thirty days' previous notice thereof shall be given in the manner
prescribed by law."
"SEC. 2. It shall be the duty of the proper authorities of any
city, town, or township, issuing bonds as aforesaid, to make all
necessary arrangements, and provide for the prompt payment of all
interest and other liabilities accruing thereon, and to levy such
taxes as may be necessary therefor as other taxes are levied by
them."
"SEC. 3. This act shall be liberally construed for the purposes
intended and expressed therein, and shall be held to be a public
act, and shall be in force from and after its passage."
Approved March 25, 1869.
This act was passed while the Constitution of Illinois of 1848
was in force.
That constitution contained the following provision (sec. 23 of
art. 3):
"Every bill shall be read on three different days in each House
. . . and every bill having passed both Houses shall be signed by
the speakers of their respective Houses, and no private or local
law which may be passed by the General Assembly shall embrace more
than one subject, and that shall be expressed in the title."
On July 2, 1870, a vote was taken by the voters of the State of
Illinois, which resulted in the adoption of a new constitution and
of certain separate articles, one of which reads as follows, and it
took effect that day:
"No county, city, town, township or other municipality shall
ever become subscriber to the capital stock of any railway or
private corporation, or make donation to or loan its credit in aid
of such corporation,
provided, however, that the adoption
of this article shall not be construed as affecting the right of
such municipality
Page 103 U. S. 688
to make such subscriptions where the same have been authorized
under existing laws by a vote of the people of such municipalities
prior to such adoption."
The first assignment of error relates to the finding of the
court, that the act by authority of which the bonds in question
were issued "was duly and constitutionally passed." The plaintiff
in error disputes this finding.
A question arises here whether this finding is open to
challenge.
One thing is clear, that there can be no review in this Court of
the finding of fact made in the court below.
Sec. 649 of the Revised Statutes declares: "The finding of the
court upon the facts, which may be either general or special, shall
have the same effect as the verdict of a jury."
The office of a bill of exceptions, where the facts are tried by
the court, is pointed out by sec. 700, Revised Statutes:
"The rulings of the court in the progress of the trial of the
cause, if excepted to at the time and duly presented by a bill of
exceptions, may be reviewed by the Supreme Court upon a writ of
error or upon appeal, and when the finding is special the review
may extend to the determination of the sufficiency of the facts
found to support the judgment."
In
Norris v.
Jackson, 9 Wall. 125, this Court said:
"A special finding is not a mere report of the evidence, but a
statement of the ultimate facts on which the law of the case must
determine the rights of the parties; a finding of the propositions
of fact which the evidence establishes, and not the evidence on
which those ultimate facts are supposed to rest. . . . Whether the
finding be general or special, it shall have the same effect as the
verdict of a jury; that is to say, it is conclusive as to the facts
so found. . . . In the case of a special verdict [finding], the
question is presented as it would be if tried by a jury, whether
the facts thus found require a judgment for plaintiff or defendant.
. . . The bill of exceptions, while professing to detail all the
evidence, is no special finding of the facts. "
It is thus seen that the only use which can be made of the bill
of exceptions, when there is a special finding of facts, is to
present the rulings of the court in the progress of the trial
Page 103 U. S. 689
upon questions of law. The facts are conclusively settled by the
finding of the court.
But the finding under consideration is not a finding of fact but
of law. The question whether an alleged statute
"is really a law or not, is a judicial one, and is to be settled
and determined by the court and judges, and is not a question of
fact to be determined by a jury."
Town of South Ottawa v. Perkins, 94 U. S.
260;
Gardner v. The
Collector, 6 Wall. 499.
So, notwithstanding the finding of the court below, the question
whether the act of March 25, 1869, was duly and constitutionally
passed, is, as one of law, open for examination here, the decision
of the court on it having been excepted to at the proper time. And
in deciding it, not only the facts presented by the bill of
exceptions, but any other accessible competent evidence may be
considered.
The plaintiff in error insists that the evidence set out in the
bill of exceptions does not sustain the finding under
consideration; in other words, that there is error in law in the
holding of the court, that upon the facts disclosed the statute in
question was duly and constitutionally passed.
It is settled by the decisions of the Supreme Court of Illinois
that the journals of the legislature may be resorted to for the
purpose of overthrowing the
prima facie evidence of the
constitutional enactment of a law furnished by the signatures of
the presiding officers of the two Houses.
Town of South Ottawa
v. Perkins, supra, where those decisions on this subject are
collected.
Both parties upon the trial in the court below introduced the
journals of the two Houses of the Illinois Legislature -- one to
prove and the other to disprove the constitutional passage of the
law. From this evidence it appears that the bill in question when
introduced into the House was designated and distinguished as House
Bill No. 231, and with the title "An Act to amend an act entitled
An Act to incorporate the Illinois Grand Trunk Railway.'" It
regularly passed the House with this title, having been read three
times on three different days and having been referred to and
reported by a committee.
Page 103 U. S.
690
In the Senate, according to the journals, the proceedings were
as follows: on February 8, a message was received from the House to
the effect that it had passed House Bill No. 231, entitled an act
to amend an act entitled "An Act to incorporate the Grand Trunk
Railway." On February 9, the bill with the same number and title
was read the first and second time and referred to a standing
committee. On March 4, House Bill No. 231, for "An Act to amend an
act entitled an act to incorporate the Illinois Grand Trunk
Railway," was reported back with amendments by the committee, to
which House Bill No. 231 had been referred, which recommended that
as amended it be read a third time and passed. The next day, House
Bill No. 231, and with the same title, except that the word
"Illinois" was omitted therefrom, was read a third time and
passed.
The Senate amendments to House Bill No. 231, with the same title
as that under which it passed the House, were agreed to by the
House. In the messages between the two Houses, in which the passage
of the bill by each is reported to the other, the word "Illinois"
is omitted from the title, but its designation as House Bill No.
231 is preserved. The bill, after its final passage, was enrolled
as House Bill No. 231, with the title, "An Act to amend an act to
incorporate the Illinois Grand Trunk Railway," and it was signed by
that title by the presiding officers of both Houses and approved
and signed by the governor.
We are now called on to decide whether upon this evidence the
court below was justified in holding that the act was duly and
constitutionally passed.
The evidence discloses the fact that in its passage through the
Senate, according to the journal of that body, the word "Illinois"
was twice dropped from the title of the bill, and that in the
message of the House to the Senate and of the Senate to the House
reporting the passage of the bill by those bodies respectively, the
word "Illinois" is left out of the title of the bill.
The contention of the plaintiff in error is that the omission of
the word "Illinois" from the title of the bill in several of its
stages in the Senate, and especially in its final passage,
Page 103 U. S. 691
defeats it as a law and renders the enactment null and void. The
ground of this claim is that, according to the journals of the two
Houses, "one bill by one title passed the House and another bill by
another title passed the Senate."
The evidence of the journals of the two Houses satisfies us that
beyond question there was but one bill, and that was House Bill No.
231, "to amend an act entitled an act to incorporate the Illinois
Grand Trunk Railway;" that this bill regularly passed through all
stages by both Houses without any change in its title, was signed
by their presiding officers respectively, and was approved and
signed by the governor.
The journals show no amendment to the title of the bill in
either House. It is therefore perfectly clear that the omission of
the word "Illinois" from the title in some of the stages of its
passage through the Senate was a mere clerical error in keeping the
journals. The designation of the bill as House Bill No. 231 was
preserved in all the stages of its passage through both Houses, and
until it was finally signed by the presiding officers of the two
Houses and approved by the governor. The statute book of the State
of Illinois shows that only one act was ever passed to incorporate
any "Grand Trunk Railway" and that was the act to incorporate the
Illinois Grand Trunk Railway. Therefore the act in question must
have been an amendment to that act of incorporation, and could be
an amendment to no other.
The fact of the identity of the bill passed by the two Houses is
so clear that it seems to us no court could have any doubt on the
subject.
In the case of
Larrison v. Peoria, Atlanta, & Decatur
Railroad Co., 77 Ill. 11, it appeared that by some clerical
error the bill was introduced into the Senate as "Senate Bill No.
453, for an act to incorporate the Peoria, Atlanta, & Danville
Railroad Company," thus changing the name of Decatur, in the title,
to Danville; but as the bill preserved its identity by holding its
number, "453," the Supreme Court of Illinois decided that the act
was constitutionally passed. It said:
"And the question is, was the bill for the act read three times
in the Senate before its passage by that body? If the entries on
the journal refer to the same bill, then the requirements.
Page 103 U. S. 692
of the organic law are satisfied. The question is one of
identity. Do these entries show there was one or two bills acted
upon by the Senate? The number is the same throughout. About that
there is not the pretence of the slightest doubt, and it is
manifest that to have more than one bill pending at the same time,
with the same number, would lead to confusion; it would defeat the
very object of numbering bills, which is to preserve their identity
and prevent confusion."
Another objection, based on the fact that the journals do not
preserve the exact title of the bill in all the stages of its
passage through the Senate, is that the title did not at all times
conform to the constitutional requirement that the subject of the
bill should be expressed therein.
There is no rule of parliamentary law, and there is no provision
of the Constitution of Illinois, which requires a bill to preserve
the same title through all its stages in both Houses.
Larrison
v. Peoria, Atlanta, & Decatur Railroad Co., supra; Binz v.
Weber, 81 Ill. 288;
Plummer v. People, 74
id. 361. But, as already said, it is sufficiently clear
from the journals of the two Houses that no change whatever was
made in the title of the bill in either House, and that the
omission of the word "Illinois" from the title, as given in the
journals of the Senate, was a mere clerical error, which could
deceive or mislead no one. We are of opinion that these objections
to the act are slender grounds for declaring to be null and void a
law which appears on the statute book of a state, and is found
among its archives.
It is next insisted that the title of the act, as it appears
upon the statute book of the state, does not express its
subject.
The Supreme Court of Illinois has substantially decided this
point against the plaintiff in error in the case of
Belleville
Railroad Co. v. Gregory, 15 Ill. 20.
See also Unity v.
Burrage, supra, p. 447, where other cases decided by the
Supreme Court of Illinois, on this question, are cited.
San
Antonio v. Mehaffy, 96 U. S. 312.
We are clear, therefore, that the circuit court was right in
holding that the act, by authority of which the bonds in question
were issued, was duly and constitutionally passed.
It is next contended by the plaintiff in error, that, under
the
Page 103 U. S. 693
act referred to, the corporate authorities of the township alone
could make the subscription to the stock of the railroad company
and issue the bonds of the township. This claim is based on sec. 5,
art. 9, of the Constitution of Illinois of 1848, which prohibits
the legislature from authorizing any person to impose a burden of
debt on the township, except the corporate authorities.
The stock was subscribed and the bonds were issued in this case
by the supervisor and clerk, and it is insisted that neither the
act of the legislature nor the constitution of the state allowed
this to be done; that it could only be done by the corporate
authorities, which included the legal voters as well as the
supervisor and clerk.
In construing a similar statute, passed under the Constitution
of 1848, the Supreme Court of Illinois has decided that, after a
vote by the electors of a township in favor of a donation to aid in
the construction of a railroad, the supervisor and clerk of the
township were the proper corporate authorities to subscribe for the
stock of the company, and issue the bonds of the township therefor.
Town of Windsor v. Hallett, 97 Ill. 204;
Town of
Douglass v. Niantic Savings Bank (not yet reported).
These cases are conclusive of this question, if indeed it needed
any authority to settle it.
The next point made by the plaintiff in error is that the Act of
March 25, 1869, by authority of which the bonds were issued, did
not authorize an election to be held on the question of subscribing
stock in the railway company, at which only legal voters should
vote; that the word "inhabitants," whose approval the act requires,
cannot be construed to mean "voters" or "electors."
No copy of the bonds appears in the pleadings in this case. The
special finding of the court, to which alone we are authorized to
look to ascertain the facts upon which the judgment of the court
rests, declares that the bonds recite on their face that they are
issued "in pursuance of a vote of the
people of said town,
held and taken June 25, 1870."
The popular signification of the words "people of a town" and
"inhabitants of a town" is the same, so that, according to the
finding of the court, the bonds recited on their face a
Page 103 U. S. 694
substantial compliance with the requirement of the statute that
the proposition for the subscription to the stock of the railroad
company should be submitted to the "inhabitants of the town and
affirmed by them." The plaintiff being, as appears from the
findings of the court, a
bona fide holder of the bonds
without notice, is not bound to go behind this recital.
But it is not necessary, in order to maintain the validity of
the bonds, to rely on this finding.
The findings of the court show that the "voters" of said town,
on June 25, 1870, voted in favor of the proposition to subscribe
$30,000 to the stock of the said railroad company.
We think that, by a fair construction of the act, this was all
that was necessary. The act, it is true, requires the approval of
the "inhabitants" of the town. In its broadest sense this would
include all sexes, ages, and conditions. To require the approval by
a vote of the "inhabitants" in this sense would be an absurdity.
The act itself is its own interpreter, and shows that this is not
its meaning. It provides that, upon the application of ten voters,
it shall be the duty of the clerk
"to call an election, in the same manner that other elections
for said city, town, or township are called, for the purpose of
determining whether said city, town, or township will subscribe to
the stock of said railway."
The calls for "other elections for said city, town, or township"
are addressed to the legal voters, and legal voters only are
allowed to vote. The act, though carelessly drawn, clearly meant to
restrict the election to the voters, and the approval of the
"inhabitants" was to be indicated by the vote of a majority of the
legal voters. This approval the finding of the court shows was
obtained.
The intimation that the law required two elections for precisely
the same purpose, one at which the inhabitants, and the other at
which the electors, of the town should vote, imputes to the General
Assembly an absurdity in legislation which the language of the act
utterly fails to justify.
We think, therefore, that this assignment of error is without
substantial ground to rest on.
It appears from the finding of the court that an election was
held on June 25, 1870, on the proposition to subscribe
Page 103 U. S. 695
$30,000 to said railroad company. The plaintiff in error claims
that this proposition was never approved by the directors of the
company, and, therefore, that the bonds issued to carry this
proposition into effect were issued without authority, and are
therefore invalid.
There are two answers to this claim:
1. The Act of March 25, 1869, does not require the approval of
the directors of the company to the proposition as condition
precedent to the subscription of stock and the issue of bonds.
2. The court finds that the bonds contained recitals averring
that they were issued by authority of the Act of March 25, 1869,
and in pursuance of a vote of the people of said town, which is in
effect an averment that the conditions prescribed by said act to be
performed before said bonds could be issued had been in fact
performed. Whether the conditions precedent had been complied with
was a question which was in effect left by the law to the
"corporate authorities" who issued the bonds, to decide. The
plaintiff, therefore, being a
bona fide holder, was not
bound to look beyond the legislative act and the recitals in the
bonds.
Town of Coloma v. Eaves, 92 U. S.
484;
Marcy v. Township of Oswego, 92 U. S.
637.
The bill of exceptions shows that the plaintiff in error
objected to the admission in evidence of the coupons sued on,
because 1, they were not presented to the proper officers or demand
of payment made thereon and notice given to the drawers before
suit; 2, because they were detached from and not annexed to any
bond, and the absence of the bond was not accounted for, and the
same were not negotiable paper sufficient to base an action upon;
and 3, because said coupons never were endorsed and are not
negotiable by delivery.
None of these grounds of objection are tenable. The form of the
coupons does not change their nature. They are evidences of the
sums due for interest on the bonds. The fact that they are made
payable at a particular place does not make a presentation for
payment at that place necessary before a suit can be maintained on
them.
Wallace v.
McConnell, 13 Pet. 136;
Irvine v. Withers,
1 Stew. (Ala.) 234;
Montgomery v. Elliott, 6 Ala. 701.
The second and third grounds of objection are answered by
Page 103 U. S. 696
the decision of this Court in
Clark v.
Iowa City, 20 Wall. 583, where it is said:
"Coupons for installments of interest when severed from bonds
are negotiable and pass by delivery. They then cease to be
incidents, and become in fact independent claims, and they do not
lose their validity if for any cause the bonds are cancelled or
paid before maturity, nor their negotiable character, nor their
ability to support separate actions."
See also Aurora City v. West, 7
id. 82;
Thompson v. Lee County, 3
id. 327.
It is next alleged for error that the circuit court allowed
interest on the coupons sued on to be included in the judgment.
The coupons bore interest from the day when they were payable.
Aurora City v. West, supra; Clark v. Iowa City, supra; Town of
Genoa v. Woodruff, 92 U. S. 502.
There is nothing in the act authorizing the issue of the bonds
to which the coupons belonged that takes them out of these
decisions. And we have been referred to no legislation in the State
of Illinois which forbids the allowance of interest on this kind of
commercial paper.
The failure to present the coupons for payment does not prevent
the running of interest. If the town had shown that it had money
ready to pay the coupons at the time and place where they were
payable, this would have been a defense to the claim for interest.
Wallace v. McConnell, supra. But no such proof was
offered, nor was it claimed that the fact existed.
Finally, the fact that the corporate authorities of the
plaintiff in error issued bonds to the amount of $40,000, when the
election held on June 25, 1870, only authorized the issue of
$30,000, can have no effect on the rights of the defendant in error
to his judgment in this case. The finding of the court is, that his
bonds recited on their face that they were issued by authority of
the act of March 25, 1869, and in pursuance of the vote taken June
25, 1870.
There was nothing in the act which placed any limit to the
amount of stock which the town might subscribe, and the recitals of
the bonds gave no notice to the holder that the bonds issued
exceeded the amount of stock which the town had voted to subscribe.
There was nothing to arouse the suspicions of a
Page 103 U. S. 697
purchaser; nothing to put him on inquiry. As the defendant in
error is a
bona fide holder for value, the fact that the
amount of the bonds issued by the corporate authorities exceeded by
$10,000 the amount of stock voted for by the inhabitants June 25,
1870, can have no influence upon his right to a recovery upon the
bonds which he holds.
We find no error in the record.
Judgment affirmed.