Under the statutes of the United States, a ledge containing
gold-bearing rock, which has formerly been profitably worked for
mining purposes, but all work upon which has been abandoned, and
which at the date of
Page 151 U. S. 659
a town site patent of the land within which it lies is not known
to be valuable for mining purposes, is not excepted from the
operation of the town site patent, although, after the town site
patent has taken effect, the land is found to be still valuable for
mining purposes.
This Court, upon a writ of error to the highest court of a state
in an action at law, cannot review its judgment upon a question of
fact.
The case is stated in the opinion.
MR. JUSTICE GRAY delivered the opinion of the Court.
This was an action of ejectment, brought November 15, 1887, by
the executors of Philip Richards against Harriet Dower and others,
in the Superior Court for the County of Nevada, in the State of
California, to recover possession of two lots in the City of Nevada
in that county which the complaint alleged that Richards, in his
lifetime, was the owner and in possession of.
The defendants, in their answer, alleged that Harriet Dower, of
whom the other defendants were servants, was the owner and in
possession and entitled to the possession, of a quartz ledge and
mine, called the "Wagner Ledge," situated partly upon and crossing
the lots demanded; that Richards had no other right of possession
than under a town site patent granted by the United States to the
City of Nevada in 1869; that the ledge was known to be a
gold-bearing ledge, and was held and worked as such long prior and
subsequent to that patent, and was by the laws of the United States
excepted from that patent, and that Harriet Dower had located the
ledge, and was engaged in working it, including three hundred feet
on either side thereof, under those laws. The laws relied on by the
defendants were the Acts of July 26, 1866, c. 262; March 2, 1867,
c. 177, 14 Stat. 251, 541; June 8, 1868, c. 53, 15 Stat. 67; May
10, 1872, c. 152, 17 Stat. 91; Rev.Stat. § 2392.
Page 151 U. S. 660
A jury trial was waived, and the case submitted to the superior
court, which made findings of fact, in substance, as follows: a
town site patent for a tract including the two lots demanded was
issued July 1, 1869, by the United States to the City of Nevada,
which, before May 1, 1887, conveyed all its title in these lots to
Richards, and that title was now vested in the plaintiffs as his
executors. Before the issue of that patent, the Wagner ledge was
known to exist as a gold-bearing quartz lode, but had never been
located or marked out, and there was no proof that any local mining
rules were in force in that district. For many years before 1869,
it had been profitably worked, and many tons of gold-bearing rock
extracted from it by persons who were trespassers upon the public
domain and were not shown to have had more than a mere
possessio pedis of certain shafts, tunnels, and dumps. In
the winter of 1868-69, work on the ledge was abandoned, and no work
was afterwards done by those persons, and the defendants did not
claim under them. In 1884, Harriet Dower, being a citizen of the
United States and qualified to make a mining location, attempted to
make a quartz mining location upon the ledge within the lots
demanded, which, in manner and form, complied with the laws of the
United States in respect to mining locations, and by virtue of her
location she claimed the ledge, with three hundred feet on each
side thereof, and since did annual work thereon, as required by
those laws, excavated the soil, sank shafts, erected buildings, and
piled earth, sand, and debris across the surface of the lots. For
more than a year before her attempted location, no annual work had
been done by any one upon the ledge. On May 1, 1887, Richards was
the owner and in possession, and entitled to the possession, of the
lots, and the defendants wrongfully and unlawfully ejected him from
the part claimed by them, and ever since wrongfully and unlawfully
withheld the possession thereof from him and his executors.
Upon the facts so found, the court decided as matter of law that
the plaintiffs were owners and entitled to the possession of these
lots; that no part of them was subject to location as a mining
claim at the date of Harriet Dower's attempted
Page 151 U. S. 661
location; that the whole of the lots passed to Richards by the
town site patent and the subsequent conveyance, and that the
plaintiffs were entitled to judgment against the defendants for the
restitution of the part claimed by the latter, and for costs, and
gave judgment for the plaintiffs accordingly. Upon a statement of
the evidence, agreed to in writing by counsel and certified by the
judge, a motion for a new trial was made and denied. From the
judgment for the plaintiffs and from the order denying a new trial,
the defendants, in accordance with the state practice, appealed to
the supreme court of the state.
That court, as stated in its opinion filed in the case and
reported in 81 Cal. 44, affirmed the judgment upon the following
grounds: upon the facts found and the evidence stated in the record
before that court, it decided as matter of fact that before 1869, a
gold-bearing quartz ledge was known to exist and had been
profitably worked within the limits of these lots, but had never
been located or marked out; that in the winter of 1868-69, all work
on the ledge was abandoned, and no work was afterwards done there
until one of the defendants, in 1884, made the location under which
they claimed; that from the time when work was so abandoned until
July 1, 1869, when the town site patent was granted, the portion of
the ledge included within the boundaries of these lots was regarded
as worked out, and as of no further value for mining purposes, and
was not known to be valuable for mining purposes at the date of
that patent, nor discovered to be so before the plaintiffs and
their predecessors occupied and improved the lots for the purpose
of residence under the town site patent. Having decided that to be
the state of facts at the time when the town site patent took
effect, and assuming that the provision of the Act of March 2,
1867, that no title should be acquired by a town site patent "to
any mine of gold, silver, cinnabar, or copper," was not repealed by
the provision of the Act of June 8, 1868, c. 53, that no title
should be so acquired to "any valid mining claim or possession held
under the existing laws of Congress," but stood with it, as in the
reenactment of both provisions in § 2392 of the Revised Statutes,
the court decided as matter of law that land not known at
Page 151 U. S. 662
the time to be valuable for minerals was not excepted from the
operation of a town site patent even if afterwards found to contain
minerals which might be profitably worked. The defendants thereupon
sued out this writ of error.
The only federal question presented by the writ of error is
whether there was error in this decision in matter of law.
The proposition of law on which the plaintiffs in error rely is
thus stated in their brief:
"When a quartz ledge, known to be gold-bearing and to have been
profitably worked prior to the acquisition of a town site patent in
the year 1869, and not then worked out, is situated within the
exterior boundaries of the patent, . . . the rights of the
government and its mining grantees are not limited to such actual
mining or tunnel possession as may have existed before the town
site patent, or to any continuance of a mining claim or possession
by prior locators or their grantees, but the government owns and
can grant the right to any quartz mine or gold-bearing ledge which
was known to exist and to be valuable for minerals before the town
site patent was obtained, and which was not worked out when the
town site patent was obtained, and the rights of a subsequent
locator under the government, by virtue of its reservation of the
mine, and of the mining acts of 1866 and 1872, include a reasonable
quantity of surface for the convenient working of the ledge, not
exceeding three hundred feet on each side thereof."
The essential difference between this proposition and that
affirmed by the Supreme Court of the State of California is that
the plaintiffs in error insist that if the ledge in question was
known to have been gold-bearing and to have been profitably worked
before the acquisition of the town site patent, and had not in fact
been worked out before the acquisition of that patent, the right to
that ledge was not included in the patent, but was reserved to the
United States, and would pass by a subsequent mining location,
whereas the court held that if the ledge was not known at the time
of the acquisition of the town site patent to contain such an
amount of minerals as to be valuable for mining purposes, it was
not excepted from the operation of that patent.
Page 151 U. S. 663
There can be no doubt that the decision of the supreme court of
the state in this respect was correct. It is established by former
decisions of this Court that under the acts of Congress which
govern this case, in order to except mines or mineral lands from
the operation of a town site patent, it is not sufficient that the
lands do in fact contain minerals, or even valuable minerals, when
the townsite patent takes effect, but they must at that time be
known to contain minerals of such extent and value as to justify
expenditures for the purpose of extracting them, and if the lands
are not known at that time to be so valuable for mining purposes,
the fact that they have once been valuable or are afterwards
discovered to be still valuable for such purposes, does not defeat
or impair the title of persons claiming under the town site patent.
Deffeback v. Hawke, 115 U. S. 392;
Davis v. Weibbold, 139 U. S. 507.
The principal ground on which the plaintiffs in error seek to
reverse the judgment of the Supreme Court of California is that its
decision in matter of fact was erroneous and contrary to the weight
of the evidence in the case; but to review the decision of the
state court upon the question of fact is not within the
jurisdiction of this Court.
In the legislation of Congress, from the foundation of the
government, a writ of error which brings up matter of law only has
always been distinguished from an appeal, which, unless expressly
restricted, brings up both law and fact.
Wiscart v.
Dauchy, 3 Dall. 321;
United
States v. Goodwin, 7 Cranch. 108;
Cohens v.
Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264,
19 U. S. 410;
Hemmenway v.
Fisher, 20 How. 255,
61 U. S. 258;
In re Neagle, 135 U. S. 1,
135 U. S. 42.
In the first Judiciary Act, the whole appellate jurisdiction of
this Court was limited to matters of law. While an appeal lay from
the district court to the circuit court in admiralty cases, neither
the judgments or decrees of the circuit court, whether in law,
equity, or admiralty, nor judgments or decrees of the highest court
of a state, could be reviewed by this Court except by writ of
error. Act of September 24, 1789, c. 20, §§ 19, 22-25, 1 Stat.
83-86.
Page 151 U. S. 664
Under that act, it was held that a decree in admiralty could not
be reviewed by this Court in matter of fact, and Chief Justice
Ellsworth, after laying down the rule that the appellate
jurisdiction of this Court could only be exercised within the
regulations prescribed by Congress, said:
"It is to be considered, then, that the judicial statute of the
United States speaks of an 'appeal' and of a 'writ of error,' but
it does not confound the terms, nor use them promiscuously. They
are to be understood, when used, according to their ordinary
acceptation, unless something appears in the act itself to control,
modify, or change the fixed and technical sense which they have
previously borne. An appeal is a process of civil law origin, and
removes a cause entirely, subjecting the fact, as well as the law,
to a review and retrial; but a writ of error is a process of common
law origin, and it removes nothing for reexamination but the
law."
Wiscart v.
Dauchy, 3 Dall. 321, 327 [argument of counsel --
omitted];
The
Perseverance, 3 Dall. 336;
The Charles
Carter, 4 Dall. 22.
In 1803, Congress substituted an appeal from the circuit court
to this Court, instead of a writ of error, in cases in equity and
in admiralty, and upon such an appeal the facts as well as the law
were open to review in both those classes of cases until 1875, when
the appeal in admiralty was restricted to questions of law. Act
March 3, 1803, c. 40, 2 Stat. 244;
The San
Pedro, 2 Wheat. 132;
The
Baltimore, 8 Wall. 377; Rev.Stat. § 692; Act of
February 16, 1875, c. 77, § 1, 18 Stat. 315;
The Francis
Wright, 105 U. S. 381.
Judgments of the circuit court in actions at law have remained
reviewable by writ of error only.
Jones v.
La Valette, 5 Wall. 579; Act of July 4, 1840, c.
43, § 3, 5 Stat. 393; Rev.Stat. § 691. Upon such a writ of error,
this Court, as is well settled, cannot review a decision of a
question of fact even if by the local practice, as in Louisiana,
the law and the facts are tried together by the judge without a
jury.
In such a case, Mr. Justice Story said:
"We have no authority, as an appellate court, upon a writ of
error, to revise the evidence in the court below in order to
ascertain whether the judge rightly interpreted the evidence or
drew right conclusions from it. That is the proper province of the
jury, or of
Page 151 U. S. 665
the judge himself, if the trial by jury is waived and it is
submitted to his personal decision."
Hyde v.
Booraem, 16 Pet. 169,
41 U. S.
176.
In a petitory action in the nature of ejectment to recover land
in Louisiana, the subject was fully explained by Chief Justice
Taney, who (according to the original opinion on file, misprinted
in some particulars in the official report) said:
"According to the laws of that state, unless one of the parties
demands a trial by jury, the court decides the fact as well as the
law, and if the judgment is removed to a higher court for revision,
the decision upon the fact as well as the law is open for
examination in the appellate court. The record transmitted to the
superior court, therefore, in the state practice, necessarily
contains all the evidence offered in the inferior court; and as
there is no distinction between courts of law and courts of equity,
the legal and equitable rights of the parties are tried and decided
in the same proceeding. In the courts of the United States,
however, the distinction between courts of law and of equity is
preserved in Louisiana as well as in the other states, and the
removal of the case from the circuit court to this Court is
regulated by act of Congress, and not by the practice of Louisiana,
and the writ of error, by which, alone, a case can be removed from
a circuit court when sitting as a court of law, brings up for
revision here nothing but questions of law, and if the case has
been tried according to the Louisiana practice, without the
intervention of a jury, the decisions of the circuit court upon
questions of fact are as conclusive as if they had been found by
the jury."
The Chief Justice stated that, upon the first argument of the
case at a former term, the Court, its attention "not having been
drawn to the difference between an appeal in the state practice and
the writ of error from this Court," and being of opinion that the
weight of evidence was against the authenticity of an instrument
under which one of the parties claimed title, and which the circuit
court had held to be authentic, therefore reversed the judgment of
that court; but that this Court, upon reconsideration, was
"unanimously of opinion that the decision of the circuit court
upon this question of fact
Page 151 U. S. 666
must, like the finding of a jury, be regarded as conclusive;
that the writ of error can bring up nothing but questions of law,
and that, in deciding the question of title in this Court, the
paper referred to must be treated and considered as authentic and
sufficiently proved,"
and had therefore ordered the case to be reargued.
United States v.
King, 7 How. 833,
48 U. S.
844-845. Upon the final argument, while four of the
Justices dissented from the opinion of the Court upon the principal
question of law presented by the record, none of them differed from
the Chief Justice on the question of practice, and Mr. Justice
Wayne, who delivered the principal dissenting opinion, said:
"No point has been more repeatedly and authoritatively settled
than that this Court will not, upon a writ of error, revise or give
judgment as to the facts, but takes them as found by the court
below and as they are exhibited by the record."
7 How.
48 U. S. 865.
See also Parks v.
Turner, 12 How. 39, 43;
Arthur v.
Hart, 17 How. 6,
48 U. S. 12;
Lanfear v.
Hunley, 4 Wall. 204,
71 U. S. 209;
Generes v.
Campbell, 11 Wall.193;
Jeffries v. Mutual Ins.
Co., 110 U. S. 305,
110 U. S.
309.
The only appellate jurisdiction which has ever been conferred by
Congress upon this Court to review the judgments or decrees at law
or in equity of the highest court of a state has been by writ of
error.
Cohens v.
Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264,
19 U. S. 410;
Verden v.
Coleman, 22 How. 192; Act of September 24, 1789, c.
20, § 25, 1 Stat. 85; Act of February 5, 1867, c. 28, § 2, 14 Stat.
386; Rev.Stat. § 709; Act March 3, 1891, c. 517, § 5, 26 Stat.
827.
Such a writ of error can be sustained only when the decision of
the state court is against a right claimed under the Constitution
and laws of the United States.
Montgomery v.
Hernandez, 12 Wheat. 129;
Missouri v.
Andriano, 138 U. S. 496. And
if the decision of the state court rests on an independent ground
of law not involving any federal question, this Court has no
jurisdiction.
New Orleans Waterworks Co. v. Louisiana Sugar
Co., 125 U. S. 18;
Eustis v. Bolles, 150 U. S. 361;
California Powder Works v. Davis, ante, 151 U. S. 389. The
reasons against its jurisdiction are as strong, if not stronger,
when the decision of the state court proceeds upon matter of fact
only.
Page 151 U. S. 667
When, indeed, the question decided by the state court is not
merely of the weight or sufficiency of the evidence to prove a
fact, but of the competency and legal effect of the evidence as
bearing upon a question of federal law, the decision may be
reviewed by this Court. It was accordingly said by Mr. Justice
Catron:
"The powers of the Supreme Court are limited, in cases coming up
from the state courts, under the twenty-fifth section of the
Judiciary Act, to questions of law, where the final judgment or
decree draws in question the validity of a treaty or statute of the
United States, etc., or where their construction is drawn in
question, or an authority exercised under them, and as the
admission of evidence to establish the mere fact of boundary in
regard to the extent of grant cannot raise a question involving
either the validity or construction of an act of Congress, etc.,
this Court has no jurisdiction to consider and revise the decision
of a state court, however erroneous it may be, in admitting the
evidence to establish the fact; but when evidence is admitted as
competent for this purpose, and it is sought to give it effect for
other purposes which do involve questions giving this Court
jurisdiction, then the decisions of state courts on the effect of
such evidence may be fully considered here, and their judgments
reversed or affirmed, in a similar manner as if a like question had
arisen in a Supreme Court of error of a state, when reversing the
proceedings of inferior courts of original jurisdiction."
Mackay v.
Dillon, 4 How. 421,
45 U. S. 447.
The only questions of evidence considered in that case arose upon a
bill of exceptions to the legal competency of evidence relied on to
prove a title under an act of Congress.
Again, in
Almonester v. Kenton, Mr. Justice Catron
said:
"Now that this Court has no jurisdiction, under the twenty-fifth
section of the Judiciary Act of 1789, to reexamine the decision of
a state court which drew in question the mere fact of where a
dividing line between two tracts of land was, is too plain for
discussion. Had the decision of the Supreme Court of Louisiana
stopped here, then certainly jurisdiction would be wanting."
50 U. S. 9 How. 1,
50 U. S. 7. And
this Court assumed jurisdiction of that case solely because the
state court had
Page 151 U. S. 668
gone further and had given a construction to an act of
Congress.
So, in
Moreland v. Page, this Court dismissed a writ of
error to review the judgment of a state court upon a question of
the proper boundary between two tracts of land, although the owner
of each claimed under a grant from the United States, and Mr.
Justice Grier, in delivering judgment, said:
"It is a question of fact, depending on monuments to be found on
the ground, documents in the land office, or the opinion of experts
or surveyors appointed by the court or the parties. If the accident
to the controversy that both parties claim title under the United
States should be considered as sufficient to bring it within our
jurisdiction, then every controversy involving the title to such
lands, whether it involve the inheritance, partition, devise, or
sale of it, may, with equal propriety, be subject to the
examination of this Court in all time to come."
61 U. S. 20 How.
522,
61 U. S. 523.
In
Lytle v. Arkansas, in which the Supreme Court of
Arkansas had decided against a preemptive right claimed under the
laws of the United States, Mr. Justice Catron said:
"It is not material whether the invalidity of the title was
decreed in the Supreme Court of Arkansas upon a question of fact or
of law. The fact that the title was rejected in that court
authorizes this Court to reexamine the decree."
63 U. S. 22 How.
193,
63 U. S. 203.
Those observations must be taken as applied to the case before the
court, in which the decision of the question of fact depended on
the legal effect of acts of officers of the United States regarding
that title, and that it was not intended to enlarge the scope of
the appellate jurisdiction of this Court is evident from the cases
there cited.
See also Maguire v.
Tyler, 1 Black 195,
66 U. S.
203.
That this Court, in an action at law, at least, has no
jurisdiction to review the decision of the highest court of a state
upon a pure question of fact, although a federal question would or
would not be presented, according to the way in which the question
of fact was decided, is clearly settled by a series of later
decisions, some of them in cases very like the one now before
us.
Page 151 U. S. 669
In
Lewis v.
Campau, 3 Wall. 106 (1865), a decision of the state
court as to the value of land conveyed by deed, upon which depended
the requisite amount of stamps under the revenue law of the United
States, was held not to be reviewable, although, if the value of
the land had been admitted, a federal question would have been
presented.
Hall v.
Jordon, 15 Wall. 393.
In
Boggs v. Mining Co. (1865), a right of possession
for the purpose of extracting gold from quartz rock was claimed "by
a license inferred from the general policy of the state or of the
United States in relation to mines of gold and silver and the lands
containing them," and a writ of error to review a decision of the
Supreme Court of California against the claim was dismissed by this
Court, speaking by Chief Justice Chase, for the following
reasons:
"We doubt whether such a claim, even if made in the pleadings,
would be such an allegation as would give jurisdiction to this
Court. However that may be, there was no decision of the court
against the validity of such a license. The decision was that no
such license existed, and this was a finding by the court of a
question of fact upon the submission of the whole case by the
parties, rather than a judgment upon a question of law. It is the
same case, in principle, as would be made by an allegation, in
defense to an action of ejectment, of a patent from the United
States, with an averment of its loss or destruction, and a finding
by the jury that no such patent existed, and a consequent judgment
for the defendant. Such a judgment would deny not the validity, but
the existence, of the patent, and this Court would have no
jurisdiction to review it."
70 U. S. 3 Wall.
304,
70 U. S. 310.
In
Carpenter v. Williams (1869), it was held that this
Court had no jurisdiction where the decision of the state court
turned upon the identity of the person to whom a recorder of land
titles confirmed, or intended to confirm, a lot of ground, and Mr.
Justice Miller, in delivering judgment, said:
"It is a mistake to suppose that every suit for real estate in
which the parties claiming under the federal government are at
issue as to which of them is entitled to the benefit of that title
necessarily raises a question of federal cognizance. If this were
so, the title to all the vast domain once vested in the United
Page 151 U. S. 670
States could be brought from the state courts to this
tribunal."
76 U. S. 9 Wall.
785,
76 U. S. 786.
In
Crary v. Devlin, decided February 21, 1876, in an
action to recover the price of alcohol sold, the defendants
contended that the sale was unlawful because of a violation of the
internal revenue laws of the United States. The Court of Appeals of
New York gave judgment for the plaintiff because no such violation
was proved, and this Court dismissed the writ of error upon the
authority of
Boggs v. Mining Co., above cited, Chief
Justice Waite saying:
"There could have been no decision of the Court of Appeals
against the validity of any statute of the United States, because
it was found that the facts upon which the defendants below relied
to bring their case within the statute in question did not exist.
The judgment did not deny the validity of the statute, but the
existence of the facts necessary to bring the case within its
operation."
23 Lawyers C. P. Co's Rep. 510, 511.
In
Republican River Bridge Co. v. Kansas Pacific
Railway, decided a week later, in an action at law concerning
the title to real estate in which each party claimed under a grant
from Congress, a district court of the State of Kansas, to which
the case had been submitted without the intervention of a jury,
made findings of fact, upon which it declared the law to be for the
defendant. Its judgment was affirmed by the supreme court of the
state, and the plaintiff sued out a writ of error from this Court.
Mr. Justice Miller, in delivering the opinion, said:
"The finding by the district court was received by the supreme
court of the state as conclusive as to all facts in issue, and it
is equally conclusive upon us. Where a right is set up under an act
of Congress in a state court, any matter of law found in the
record, decided by the highest court of the state, bearing on the
right so set up under the act of Congress, can be reexamined here.
In chancery cases or in any other class of cases where all the
evidence becomes part of the record in the highest court of the
state, the same record being brought here, this Court can review
the decision of that court on both the law and the fact so far as
may be necessary to determine the validity of the right set up
under
Page 151 U. S. 671
the act of Congress; but in cases where the facts are submitted
to a jury and are passed upon by the verdict in a common law
action, this Court has the same inability to review those facts, in
a case coming from a state court, that it has in a case coming from
a circuit court of the United States. This conclusiveness of the
facts found extends to the finding by a state court to whom they
have been submitted by waiving a jury, or to a referee, where they
are so held by state laws, as well as to the verdict of a
jury."
And
Boggs v. Mining Co. and
Crary v. Devlin,
above cited, were referred to as supporting this conclusion. 92
U.S.
92 U. S.
315-317.
Whether the suggestion in that opinion as to the power of this
Court, in chancery cases, to review the decision of a state court
on both the law and the fact is to be limited to cases in which the
decree of that court is general upon the whole record, without
specifically passing upon any question of fact, and whether the
suggestion, especially if more broadly construed, can be reconciled
with the earlier opinions of this Court, already cited, upon writs
of error to the circuit court of the United States in admiralty
cases, or in cases tried according to the law of Louisiana, need
not now be considered.
In
Martin v. Marks (1877), upon a writ of error to the
Supreme Court of Louisiana in an action in the nature of ejectment,
Mr. Justice Miller, speaking for this Court, said that the question
whether a selection of swamp lands had in fact been filed by the
surveyor general of Louisiana in the General Land Office was "not
of that federal character which authorizes us to review the
decision of the Supreme Court of Louisiana upon it."
97 U. S. 97 U.S.
345,
97 U. S. 348.
In
Kenney v. Effinger (1885), this Court dismissed a
writ of error to the Supreme Court of Appeals of the State of
Virginia for reasons stated in the opinion delivered by MR. JUSTICE
FIELD, as follows:
"The writ of error brought by the trustee raises no federal
question which we can consider. Whether the bond of Effinger was or
was not executed with reference to Confederate notes is a question
of fact for the state court, and not one of law for this
Court."
115 U.S.
577.
Page 151 U. S. 672
.
In
Quimby v. Boyd (1888), in which various errors were
assigned in a judgment of the Supreme Court of the State of
Colorado between two adverse claimants of a lode, this Court,
speaking by the present CHIEF JUSTICE, dismissed the writ of error
for want of jurisdiction because some of the objections made in
this Court had not been taken below, and "the other alleged errors
involved questions either of fact or of state, and not of federal,
law."
128 U. S. 128 U.S.
488-489.
In
California Powder Works v. Davis, ante, 151 U. S. 389, in
which each party to a suit to quiet title claimed under a patent
from the United States confirming a Mexican grant, and the judgment
of the Supreme Court of California rested on the proposition of
fact that the grant under which the plaintiff in error deraigned
title was simulated and fraudulent, this Court dismissed the writ
of error for want of jurisdiction.
The case now before us is an action of ejectment, which was
submitted to the Supreme Court of the same state, according to the
local practice, upon findings of fact and a statement of evidence
by an inferior court of the state. From the foregoing reasons and
authorities it follows that this Court cannot review the decision
of the state court upon the question of fact whether the ledge at
the time when the town site patent took effect, was known to be
valuable for mining purposes; and, the only question of federal law
in the case having been rightly decided by that court, its judgment
is
Affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE HARLAN concurred in the judgment of affirmance, but
not in all the reasoning of the opinion.