1. The rule established in
Gaines v.
Thompson, 7 Wall. 347, that the courts will not
interfere by mandamus or injunction with the exercise by the
executive officers of duties requiring judgment or discretion,
affirmed and applied to registers and receivers of land
offices.
2. The fact that a plaintiff asserts himself to be the owner of
the tract of land, which these officers are treating as public
lands, does not take the
Page 76 U. S. 576
case out of that rule, where it is the duty of these officers to
determine upon all the facts before them, whether the land is open
to preemption or sale.
3. In such cases, if the court could entertain jurisdiction
against the land offices, the persons asserting the right of
preemption would be necessary parties to the suit.
Litchfield field his bill in the court below against Richards,
Register, and Pomeroy, Receiver of the United States Land Office at
Fort Dodge, Iowa, asking an injunction to restrain them from
entertaining and acting upon applications made to them to prove
preemptions to certain lands which lay within the land district for
which they were respectively register and receiver. The bill, which
was very full, recited the various acts of Congress and of the
state of Iowa, by which the complainant maintained that a large
list of tracts of land, supposed to belong to an original grant to
the Territory of Iowa for the purpose of improving the navigation
of the Des Moines River, became his property. The history of that
grant has been recently the subject of report in these volumes in
several cases, and it is unnecessary to repeat it. It is sufficient
to say that the bill giving that version of the matter which was
favorable to the title of the complainant, averred that he was the
legal owner of the lands; that they were not public lands, and were
in no manner subject to sale or preemption by the government, or
its officers. The defendant demurred, and the bill was dismissed
for want of equitable jurisdiction. Whereupon the complainant
appealed.
Page 76 U. S. 577
MR. JUSTICE MILLER delivered the opinion of the Court.
The principle has been so repeatedly decided in this Court, that
the judiciary cannot interfere either by mandamus or injunction
with executive officers such as the respondents here, in the
discharge of their official duties, unless those duties are of a
character purely ministerial, and involving no exercise of judgment
or discretion, that it would seem to be useless to repeat it here.
In the case of
Gaines v. Thompson, [
Footnote 1] decided at the last term of this
Court, the whole subject was fully considered, and the cases in
this Court examined. The doctrine just stated was announced as the
result of that examination. The case of
The Secretary v.
McGarrahan, of the present term, [
Footnote 2] reaffirms the principle, which must now be
considered as settled. Both these cases had reference to efforts
similar to the present, to control the officers of the land
department.
It is insisted, however, by the complainant, that the present
case does not come within the rule so laid down, and his argument
is plausible. A title consideration, however, will show that it is
unsound.
The lands in controversy are situated within the land district
over which these officers have authority to receive proof of
preemption, and grant certificate of entry. There are within that
district, of course, lands open to sale and preemption. There would
be no use for the land office if there were not. The very first
duty which the register is called on to perform, when an
application is made to him to enter a tract of land, is to
ascertain whether it is subject to entry. This depends upon a
variety of circumstances. Has there been a proclamation offering it
for sale? Has it been reserved by any action of Congress, or of the
proper department? Has it been granted by any act of Congress, or
has it been sold already? These are all questions for him to
decide, and they require the exercise of judgment and discretion.
The bill shows on its face that these officers, in the exercise of
this duty, were considering whether the reservations
Page 76 U. S. 578
of the departments and the acts of Congress, and the claim of
the plaintiff under them, took these lands out of the category of
lands subject to sale and preemption, and he asks the court to
interfere by injunction to prevent them from determining that
question, and that the court shall determine it for them. He says
the court below erred because it did not require them to come in
and answer to his claim of title, and at their own expense to put
the court in possession of their views, and defend their
instructions from the commissioner, and convert the contest before
the land department into one before the court. This is precisely
what this Court has decided that no court shall do. After the land
officers shall have disposed of the question, if any legal right of
plaintiff has been invaded, he may seek redress in the courts. He
insists that he now has the legal title. If the land department
finally decides in his favor, he is not injured. If they give
patents to the applicants for preemption, the courts can then in
the appropriate proceeding determine who has the better title or
right. To interfere now, is to take from the officers of the land
department the functions which the law confides to them and
exercise them by the court.
Another objection, equally fatal to the bill, is the want of
necessary parties.
It appears on its face, that the register and receiver have no
real interest in the matter, but that persons not named are
asserting before them the legal right to preempt these lands. These
persons are the real parties whose interests are to be affected,
and whose claim of right is adverse to plaintiff. If the court
should hear the case, and enjoin perpetually the register and
receiver from entertaining their applications, they have no further
remedy. That is the initial point of establishing their right, and
in this mode a valuable and recognized right may be wholly defeated
and destroyed, without the possibility of a hearing on the part of
the party interested. This is not a case in which the land officers
represent these claimants. They have no such duty to perform. They
might let the injunction be issued without defense, and thus a
proceeding almost
ex parte be made
Page 76 U. S. 579
to strangle the incipient right of the actual settler on the
public lands. If it can be done in this case, it can be done in
every other in which a plaintiff is willing to proceed against the
officers, without bringing the settler on the land before the
court.
Decree affirmed.
[
Footnote 1]
74 U. S. 7 Wall.
347.
[
Footnote 2]
Supra, <|76 U.S. 298|>298.
