When a township has been created by law as a territorial
division of a state, with no express grant of corporate powers, and
with no definition or restriction of the purposes for which it is
created, it is within the
Page 159 U. S. 612
power of the legislature at any time, to declare it to be a
corporation and to confer upon it such corporate powers,
appropriate to be vested in a territorial corporation for the
benefit of its inhabitants, as the legislature may think fit.
Notwithstanding the decision of the Supreme Court of South
Carolina in
Floyd v. Perrin, 30 S.C. 1, the statute of
South Carolina of December 24, 1885, which authorized townships
(already defined by names and boundaries) to subscribe for stock in
a railroad company, and county officials to issue bonds accordingly
in their behalf, and to assess and levy taxes upon the property in
the township for the payment thereof, and declared the townships to
be bodies politic and corporate for the purposes of this act, with
the necessary powers to carry out its provisions and with rights
and liabilities in respect to any causes of action growing out of
its provisions, must be held by the courts of the United States, as
to bonds issued and purchased in good faith before that decision,
to be consistent with art. 9, sect. 8, of the Constitution of South
Carolina, authorizing the corporate authorities of townships to be
vested with power to assess and collect taxes "for corporate
purposes."
This was an action, brought in the Circuit Court of the United
States for the District of South Carolina by George W. Folsom
against Township Ninety-Six, in the County of Abbeville and State
of South Carolina to recover the sum of $5,100, the amount of
coupons attached to bonds issued in behalf of that township in aid
of the construction of a railroad, and to compel the levy of a tax
upon the property in the township to pay these coupons. The
complaint contained the following allegations:
That the plaintiff was a citizen of the State of Tennessee. That
the defendant was a corporation duly chartered under and by virtue
of an act of the General Assembly of South Carolina of December 23,
1882, chartering the railroad company by the name of the Greenville
and Port Royal Railroad Company, and of an Act of December 24,
1885, amending its charter and changing its name to the Atlantic,
Greenville and Western Railroad Company, and that the defendant was
a citizen and resident of the State of South Carolina.
"That the said acts authorized and empowered the counties and
townships interested in the construction of said railroad to
subscribe to the capital stock thereof and to issue bonds in aid
thereof, and declared the boards of county commissioners of the
several counties to be the corporate agents of the townships
Page 159 U. S. 613
within their limits of said counties, respectively, and
authorized and empowered said boards respectively to execute and
issue bonds of said townships in aid of said railroad, as will more
fully appear by reference to said acts, which are by their terms
declared to be public acts."
That Township Ninety-Six lay in Abbeville County, in the State
of South Carolina, along the line of said railroad; that, in
pursuance of said acts, an election was duly held in the said
township, and resulted in favor of a subscription to said railroad
company to the amount of $20,800, and that in pursuance of said
acts, the board of county commissioners of Abbeville County on
March 25, 1886, duly executed and issued bonds of the township,
numbered on their face, and aggregating $20,800, as authorized by
those acts, with interest coupons attached at the yearly rate, of
seven percent; the bonds and coupons payable at the First National
Bank of Charleston, S.C., and the bonds containing a recital that
the township, by virtue of those acts, had subscribed for $20,800
of the common stock of the railroad company.
That the plaintiff in 1886, relying upon the recitals contained
in the bonds and upon their being legal and valid obligations of
the township, became the purchaser of certain of the bonds, with
the coupons attached, and was now the legal owner and holder
thereof.
"That at the time of the issue of said bonds and of the purchase
thereof by the plaintiff, the said bonds and coupons, and other
bonds and coupons issued as obligations of other townships under
said acts and similar acts enacted in 1872 and 1875, when the bonds
were also issued, were regarded and treated as valid securities by
the corporate authorities of said township, by the public, the
legal profession, and by the legislative, executive, and judicial
departments of the State of South Carolina, and that they
circulated freely in the market, and large sums of money were
invested in them by citizens of South Carolina, as well as other
states, believing them to be valid and valuable securities."
That by an Act of the General Assembly of South Carolina of
December 19, 1887, the validity of the bonds issued under
Page 159 U. S. 614
the former acts was distinctly recognized, and provision was
made for their payment in the same manner as provided for coupons
by the act of 1885.
That the plaintiff was now the owner and holder of unpaid
coupons to the amount of $5,100 upon his bonds, and that the
defendant had failed and refused to assess and collect taxes, or to
place money in the First National Bank of Charleston for the
payment of these coupons.
The defendant demurred to the complaint. The circuit court held
the questions raised to be controlled by the case of
Floyd v.
Perrin, 30 S.C. 1, which the circuit court was bound to
follow, and therefore sustained the demurrer and dismissed the
complaint. 59 F. 67.
The plaintiff took the case by writ of error to the Circuit
Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, which, desiring the
instructions of this Court upon certain questions or propositions
of law, certified them to this Court as follows:
"First. Whether, upon the averments of the complaint, the
circuit court was bound, in passing upon this case, by the decision
of the Supreme Court of South Carolina in
Floyd v. Perrin,
30 S.C. 1?"
"Second. Whether, if the bonds and coupons in question were
issued, put in circulation, and came to the hands of plaintiff in
error in due course of trade, for valuable consideration and
without notice, there having been at the time no decision of the
Supreme Court of South Carolina adverse to these bonds, or
identical bonds issued under similar statutes, the plaintiff in
error was entitled to recover on the coupons mentioned in said
complaint?"
"Third. Whether the acts of December 23, 1882, and of December
24, 1885, were constitutional, and the township bonds issued
thereunder, if in compliance with the acts, or in the hands of
bona fide holders for value, constituted valid
indebtedness of the township issuing the same?"
"Fourth. Whether the Act of December 19, 1887, had the effect to
validate the bonds and coupons in question and make them binding
upon the Township of Ninety-Six? "
Page 159 U. S. 619
MR. JUSTICE GRAY, after stating the case, delivered the opinion
of the Court.
By the Constitution of South Carolina of 1868, art. 9, sec.
8,
"The corporate authorities of counties, townships, school
districts, cities, towns and villages may be vested with power to
assess and collect taxes for corporate purposes."
2 Charters and Constitutions 1659.
The situation arising out of the subsequent acts of the
legislature and decisions of the courts of the state with regard to
bonds like those now in question will be best understood by stating
these acts and decisions in chronological order.
By the Act of September 26, 1868, entitled "An act to organize
townships, and to define their powers and privileges," the
inhabitants of every township were declared to be a body politic
and corporate, with power to sue and be sued, to hold and convey
real and personal estate, to make contracts, to hold meetings, to
elect town officers, to vote money for schools, burial grounds,
highways, and bridges, and to lay taxes for the purpose of keeping
highways and bridges in repair; the lines of the townships were to
be perambulated, and the marks and bounds renewed, once in every
seven years forever, and the act was to take effect, as to each
township, on the completion of the duties assigned to county
commissioners under ยงยง 11, 12, of another act of the same date, by
which the county commissioners were directed to divide the counties
into townships to establish their boundaries, and to designate the
name of each, and the time and place of holding its first meeting.
14 Statutes of South Carolina pp. 128, 143-151.
By the Act of January 19, 1870, the Township Act of 1868 was
repealed, "except that portion of the same fixing the number, names
and boundaries of the respective townships of the respective
counties." 14 Statutes of South Carolina p. 313.
Page 159 U. S. 620
The Act of December 23, 1882, chartering the Greenville and Port
Royal Railroad Company, as amended by the Act of December 24, 1885
(both of which were declared to be public acts), contained the
following provisions:
"SEC. 6. That, in addition to the provisions contained in the
preceding section for private subscription, it shall and may be
lawful for any city, town, county or township, interested in the
construction of said road, to subscribe to its capital stock such
sum as a majority of their voters, voting at an election held for
that purpose, may authorize the county commissioners or proper
authorities of such city, town, county or township, to subscribe,
which subscription shall be made in seven percent coupon bonds
payable in such installments as the county commissioners or proper
authorities of such city, town, county or township may determine,
and to be received by said company at par, said bonds to be made
payable in sixteen, twenty, twenty-four and twenty-eight years
after the date thereof, and to be of the denomination of one
hundred dollars, five hundred dollars and one thousand dollars;
provided that a sufficient sum realized from such bonds shall be
retained to complete the grading through the county or township in
which it is subscribed; provided that no election shall be held in
any of the towns, cities or townships in said counties unless
one-half of the owners of real estate situate and living in such
town, city or township shall first petition for an election on the
subject of subscribing to the capital stock, as hereinbefore
provided, and no subscription shall be made by any of the towns,
cities or townships until the conditions of this proviso shall have
been complied with."
"SEC. 9. That for the payment of the interest on such bonds as
may be issued by said counties, cities, towns or townships, the
county auditor, or other officer discharging such duties, or the
city or town treasurer, as the case may be, shall be authorized and
required to assess annually upon the property of said city, town,
county, or township such percentum as may be necessary to pay said
interest of said sum of money subscribed, which shall be known and
described in the tax book as said railroad tax, which shall be
collected by the treasurer
Page 159 U. S. 621
under the same regulations as are provided by law for the
collection of taxes in any of the counties, cities, towns, or
townships so subscribing, and which shall be paid over by the said
treasurer to the holders of said bonds, as the interest shall come
due, on presentation of the coupons, which said coupons shall be
reported to the county commissioners by said treasurer, or the
council of any city or town where there are coupons from the bonds
of such city or town, and all such coupons shall be cancelled by
the county treasurer as soon as they are paid by them."
"That for the purposes of this act, all the counties and
townships in said counties, along the line of said railroad or
which are interested in the construction as herein provided for
shall be and they are hereby declared to be bodies politic and
corporate and vested with the necessary powers to carry out the
provisions of this act, and shall have all the rights, and be
subject to all the liabilities in respect to any rights or causes
of action growing out of the provisions of this act."
"The county commissioners of the respective counties are
declared to be the corporate agents of the counties or townships so
incorporated and situate within the limits of said counties."
19 Statutes of South Carolina pp. 239-241.
The power of the legislature, under the constitution of the
state, to authorize townships to subscribe for stock and to direct
the issue of bonds in aid of the construction of railroads appears
to have been assumed as undoubted by the supreme court of the
state, April 25, 1885, in
Chamblee v. Tribble, 23 S.C. 70,
and July 14, 1886, in
Carolina Railway v. Tribble, 25 S.C.
260, 266.
By the Act of December 19, 1887, the amending act of 1885 was
further amended by adding a section providing
"that within ten years of the time when the bonds which may be
subscribed to the capital stock of said corporation shall fall due,
the money to pay the same shall be raised by taxation in the same
manner, and paid out by the county treasurer, as provided for the
payment of the annual interest on such bonds."
19 Statutes of South Carolina p. 921. The principal, if not the
only, object of this act would seem to have
Page 159 U. S. 622
been to extend to the principal sums of the bonds the provision
of the earlier statute authorizing the assessment and collection of
taxes "for the payment of the interest on said bonds."
On November 30, 1888, an action by taxpayers in Township
Ninety-Six to recover back taxes paid by them under protest to meet
the interest on bonds issued by the county commissioners in behalf
of the township under the acts of 1882 and 1885 was sustained by
the Supreme Court of South Carolina, by concurring opinions of
Chief Justice Simpson and Justice McIver, upon the ground that by
the act of 1870, repealing the act of 1868, townships were left as
mere territorial divisions, with no corporate powers, privileges,
or purposes; that as no duty was imposed on them or right given
them by the acts of 1882 and 1885 except to subscribe to stock in
this particular railroad and to assess taxes to pay the
subscription, they were without any corporate purpose, and
therefore those acts, as applied to them, were in violation of the
provision of the Constitution.
Floyd v. Perrin, 30 S.C. 1;
Whitesides v. Neely, 30 S.C. 31.
Justice McGowan dissented upon the grounds that the township
"was certainly a corporation from the adoption of the
constitution (1868) until 1870, when its corporate powers were
withdrawn by the legislature, leaving the territorial division,
with its lines, boundaries, and name already fixed, like a lifeless
body, ready, however, to have the new life of a corporation
breathed into it;"
that "no other power but the legislature could give it that new
life;" that in 1885 the legislature passed the act chartering the
railroad, in which it declared, for the purposes of this act, the
counties and townships along the line of the road (of which this
was one) to be corporations, with the necessary powers to carry out
the provisions of the act, and with the rights and liabilities in
respect to any causes of action growing out of its provisions;
that
"it may be thought by some to be rather a meager corporation,
scant in powers, authorities, and officials as such, but it must
not be overlooked that the legislature, which created it, had the
undoubted right to give it such shape and form as it thought
Page 159 U. S. 623
proper -- with a single power or a dozen,"
and that the power to aid in building a railroad, when given by
act of the legislature to a township corporation, whether a
corporation already existing or one created by the same act, was a
corporate purpose -- that is to say, a purpose benefiting the
corporation. 30 S.C. 24-30.
On December 14, 1888, petitions for rehearing of those cases
were denied. 30 S.C. 31, 33.
On December 22, 1888, an act, entitled "An act to provide for
the payment of township bonds issued in aid of railroads in this
state," was passed, to take immediate effect, beginning as
follows:
"Whereas certain townships in this state have, by their vote,
expressed their willingness to subject themselves to taxation for
the purpose of paying bonds issued by them in aid of certain
railroads, and whereas, by reason of a defect in the acts
authorizing the issue of said bonds, they have been declared
invalid, now therefore, for the purpose of carrying into effect the
expressed will of the people of said townships,"
it was enacted as follows:
"SEC 1. The township bonds heretofore issued by county
commissioners as the corporate agents of any township in this state
in aid of any railroad by vote of the inhabitants of said township
are hereby declared to be debts of said township respectively
having authorized the issue of the same. And the interest and
principal thereof shall be paid, according to the terms of the said
bonds or debt, by the assessment, levying, and collection of an
annual tax upon the taxable property in said townships, so far as
may be necessary, in like manner and by the same county officials
as the tax levied for county bonds in aid of railroads is assessed,
levied, and collected. Said tax to be known and styled in the tax
books as the township railroad tax, and when collected shall be
paid over by the treasurer of the county to the holders of said
bonds as the interest thereon may become due and according to the
terms thereof. All dividends received by or for said townships on
stock in railroad companies which have been aided by the said
township bonds or debt shall be applied by the county commissioners
of the county in which said townships
Page 159 U. S. 624
are respectively situated, primarily towards the payment or
retirement of said bonds or debt, and the surplus shall be expended
in the improvement of the highways within the territorial limits of
said township."
"SEC. 2. No tax shall be levied under the provisions of this act
to pay the interest on any township bonds until the railroad in aid
of which they were subscribed shall be completed through such
township and accepted by the railroad commissioners."
20 Statutes of South Carolina p. 12.
This statute is not mentioned in the questions certified, and,
as it is not alleged or suggested that the railroad has been
completed through this township, has no direct application to this
case. We refer to it only as part of the history of legislation and
decision in the state upon the subject.
On April 15, 1889, the Supreme Court of South Carolina held that
since, by its decision in
Floyd v. Perrin, a township
could not be authorized by the legislature to issue bonds in aid of
the construction of a railroad, it followed that the act of 1888
could not be upheld as validating bonds issued by a township under
the earlier acts, because the legislature could not ratify what it
could not have authorized, but that the act of 1888 was an original
exercise of the power of the legislature to authorize taxation for
any public purpose, such as was the building of railroads in the
state, and that the legislature, therefore, being satisfied of the
consent of the township, had constitutionally fixed upon them the
debt represented by the bonds previously issued without authority,
and to be paid according to the provisions of the new act.
State v. Whitesides, 30 S.C. 579;
State v. Neely,
30 S.C. 587.
The first question certified to this Court by the circuit court
of appeals is
"whether, upon the averments of the complaint, the circuit court
was bound, in passing upon this case, by the decision of the
Supreme Court of South Carolina in
Floyd v. Perrin, 30
S.C. 1."
The general principles which must govern the decision of this
question have been often affirmed by this Court, and were stated by
Mr. Justice Bradley in delivering judgment after great
consideration in the leading case of
Burgess v. Seligman,
as follows:
Page 159 U. S. 625
"The federal courts have an independent jurisdiction in the
administration of state laws coordinate with and not subordinate to
that of the state courts, and are bound to exercise their own
judgment as to the meaning and effect of those laws. The existence
of two coordinate jurisdiction in the same territory is peculiar,
and the results would be anomalous and inconvenient but for the
exercise of mutual respect and deference. Since the ordinary
administration of the law is carried on by the state court, it
necessarily happens that by the course of their decisions certain
rules are established which become rules of property and action in
the state, and have all the effect of law, and which it would be
wrong to disturb. This is especially true with regard to the law of
real estate and the construction of state constitutions and
statutes. Such established rules are always regarded by the federal
courts, no less than by the state courts themselves, as
authoritative declarations of what the law is. But where the law
has not been thus settled, it is the right and duty of the federal
courts to exercise their own judgment, as they also always do in
reference to the doctrines of commercial law and general
jurisprudence. So when contracts and transactions have been entered
into and rights have accrued thereon under a particular State of
the decisions, or when there has been no decision of the state
tribunals, the federal courts properly claim the right to adopt
their own interpretation of the law applicable to the case,
although a different interpretation may be adopted by the state
courts after such rights have accrued. But even in such cases, for
the sake of harmony and to avoid confusion, the federal courts will
lean towards an agreement of views with the state courts if the
question seems to them balanced with doubt. Acting on these
principles, founded as they are on comity and good sense, the
courts of the United States, without sacrificing their own dignity
as independent tribunals, endeavor to avoid, and in most cases do
avoid, any unseemly conflict with the well considered decisions of
the state courts. As, however, the very object of giving to the
national courts jurisdiction to administer the laws of the states
in controversies between
Page 159 U. S. 626
citizens of different states was to institute independent
tribunals, which it might be supposed would be unaffected by local
prejudices and sectional views, it would be a dereliction of their
duty not to exercise an independent judgment in cases not
foreclosed by previous adjudication."
107 U. S. 107 U.S.
20,
107 U. S.
33-34.
In the case at bar, the statutes of the State of South Carolina
under which the bonds were issued were passed in 1882 and 1885. The
bonds were issued in behalf of the township and were purchased by
the plaintiff in 1886. It is alleged in the complaint and admitted
by the demurrer that he purchased the bonds relying upon their
being legal and valid obligations of the township, and that at the
times of their issue and purchase, these bonds and like bonds of
other townships were regarded and treated as valid securities by
the corporate authorities of the township, by the public, by the
legal profession, and by the legislative, executive, and judicial
departments of the state. And the decisions of the supreme court of
the state during the same period appear to have assumed the
validity of such bonds.
Chamblee v. Tribble and
Carolina Railway v. Tribble, above cited.
The decision in
Floyd v. Perrin, holding such bonds to
be invalid, was by two judges only, against a strong dissent, and
was not made until November 30, 1888, and a rehearing was denied
December 14, 1888. Eight days after, on December 22, 1888, the
legislature passed an act, to take immediate effect, declaring the
bonds previously issued, in behalf of any township, to be debts of
the township and providing for their payment by taxation of the
inhabitants. Five months later, on April 15, 1889, the supreme
court of the state, in two labored opinions, the one by Chief
Justice Simpson and the other by Justice McIver, declared that, it
having been decided in
Floyd v. Perrin that the
legislature could not authorize the township to levy a tax to pay
the bonds, it could not ratify the proceedings of the township, but
yet that the statute of 1888 was a constitutional exercise of the
unlimited legislative power to authorize taxation for a public
purpose, with the consent of the township. In each of the two
cases, however, Justice McGowan,
Page 159 U. S. 627
who had dissented from the judgment in
Floyd v. Perrin,
delivered a concurring opinion in these words:
"I concur; the meaning of the opinion of the court being that
there is no necessity for the issue of any new bonds, but 'the
debt' fixed upon the several townships by the act of 1888 shall be
represented by the bonds heretofore issued, to be paid according to
the provisions of the act, and I am authorized to say that such is
the view of the other members of the court."
State v. Whitesides and
State v. Neely, above
cited.
As the debt thus held to be imposed upon the township by the act
of 1888 was the debt represented by the bonds issued under the act
of 1885, as the tax for the payment of that debt under the new act
was to be levied upon the property in the township by county
officials in substantially the same manner as under the earlier
statutes, and as the constitution of the state did not authorize
the legislature, with or without the consent of the township, to
vest its corporate authorities with power to assess and collect
taxes for any but corporate purposes, it is not easy to understand
how the later taxation could be held constitutional while the
earlier was held unconstitutional, or how the result in
State
v. Whitesides and
State v. Neely could be reached
without practically overruling
Floyd v. Perrin.
There not being shown to have been a single decision of the
state court against the constitutionality of the act of 1885 before
the plaintiff purchased his bonds, nor any settled course of
decision upon the subject, even since his purchase, the question of
the validity of these bonds must be determined by this Court
according to its own view of the law of South Carolina.
This question, which is presented in different forms by the
second and third questions certified, lies in narrow compass. The
Constitution of South Carolina of 1868 authorized the legislature
to vest the corporate authorities of townships or other municipal
corporations with power to assess and collect taxes "for corporate
purposes." By the act of 1870, townships were deprived of the
corporate powers with which they had been vested by the legislature
immediately after the adoption of the Constitution, but were still
defined by their names and
Page 159 U. S. 628
boundaries. By the act of 1882, as amended by the acts of 1885
and 1887, it was enacted that any city, town, county, or township
interested in the construction of the railroad company named might
subscribe for stock and issue bonds in aid of the building of the
railroad, and that, for the payment of the bonds and coupons, taxes
might be assessed and levied upon the property of the township, and
all the counties and townships along the line of the railroad, or
interested in its construction, were declared to be bodies politic
and corporate for the purposes of this act, and to be invested with
the necessary powers to carry out its provisions and to have all
the rights and be subject to all the liabilities in respect to any
rights or causes of action growing out of its provisions.
To aid in the building of a railroad is a public purpose, and
being for the general welfare of the ordinary municipal
corporations, such as counties, cities, and towns, through which
the road is to pass, is a corporate purpose, within the meaning of
a constitutional provision vesting in the legislature power to
authorize municipal corporations to assess and collect taxes "for
corporate purposes."
Livingston County v. Darlington,
101 U. S. 407,
101 U. S.
411-413;
Harter v. Kernochan, 103 U.
S. 562,
103 U. S. 571;
Anderson v. Santa Anna, 116 U. S. 356,
116 U. S. 363;
Bolles v. Brimfield, 120 U. S. 759;
Johnson v. Stark County, 24 Ill. 75, 88;
Chicago
&c. Railroad v. Smith, 62 Ill. 268, 276;
Nichol v.
Nashville, 9 Humph. 252, 268;
Brown v. Hertford
Commissioners, 100 N.C. 92.
This is well settled, as to counties, under the Constitution of
South Carolina. It was assumed by the supreme court of the state in
State v. Chester & Lenore Railroad, 13 S.C. 290, 317,
and in
Connor v. Green Pond &c. Railway, 23 S.C. 427,
436, and it was admitted by all the judges in
Floyd v.
Perrin, 30 S.C. 1, 13, 19, 27.
See also State v.
Whitesides, 30 S.C. 579, 584, and
State v. Neely, 30
S.C. 587, 604. It has also been affirmed as to towns by the Circuit
Court of the United States for the District of South Carolina and
by the Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit.
Darlington v. Atlantic Trust Co, 63 F. 76 and 68 F.
849.
Page 159 U. S. 629
In
Floyd v. Perrin, it was also admitted that
townships, having been declared by the legislature, in the act of
1885, in express words, to be bodies politic and corporate, must be
held to be corporations. 30 S.C. 12, 16, 25. But the ground on
which the majority of the court in that case held that act to be
unconstitutional was that the townships, having, under the existing
statutes, no other corporate duty or right except to subscribe to
the railroad and to assess taxes to pay the subscription, were
without any corporate purpose whatever, and therefore to authorize
them to assess taxes to pay the subscription was in violation of
the constitution.
We are unable to concur in that view, and are much better
satisfied with the reasoning of the dissenting opinion. When a
township has been created by law as a territorial division of the
state, with no express grant of corporate powers and with no
definition or restriction of the purposes for which it is created,
we are of opinion that it is within the power of the legislature at
any time to declare it to be a corporation and to confer upon it
such and so many corporate powers, appropriate to be vested in a
territorial corporation for the benefit of its inhabitants, as the
legislature may think fit, and that the act of 1885 was therefore a
constitutional and valid act as far as regards all the kinds of
municipal corporations named therein -- cities, towns, counties,
and townships.
In
Weightman v. Clark, 103 U.
S. 256, the statute held to be unconstitutional
purported to confer the power to issue bonds in aid of the
construction of a railroad upon school districts established and
existing for educational purposes only. In
Lewis v. Pima
County, 155 U. S. 54, a
territorial statute purporting to confer upon a county the power to
issue similar bonds was held unconstitutional because the
fundamental law limited obligations of any municipal corporation to
such as should be "necessary for the administration of its internal
affairs."
The result is that the first question certified must be answered
in the negative, and the second and third questions in the
affirmative, and the fourth question becomes immaterial.
Ordered accordingly.