Leavenworth, Lawrence and Galveston Railroad Company v. United States
Citation | 23 L.Ed. 634,92 U.S. 733 |
Parties | LEAVENWORTH, LAWRENCE, AND GALVESTON RAILROAD COMPANY v. UNITED STATES |
Decision Date | 01 October 1875 |
Court | United States Supreme Court |
APPEAL from the Circuit Court of the United States for the District of Kansas.
This is a bill, filed by the United States against the Leavenworth, Lawrence, and Galveston Railroad Company, to establish its title to certain tracts of land lying within the Osage country in Kansas, which were certified to the Governor of Kansas as forming part of the grant made by Congress to that State, to aid in the construction of certain railroads. The court granted the prayer of the bill, and the company appealed.
The treaty with the Great and Little Osage tribes of Indians of June 2, 1825 (7 Stat. 240), contains the following provision:——
ARTICLE II. 'Within the limits of the country above ceded and relinquished, there shall be reserved to and for the Great and Little Osage tribe or nation aforesaid, so long as they may choose to occupy the same, the following described tract of land.'
The land embraces, with other tracts, that mentioned in the first article of a treaty with those Indians, which was concluded Sept. 29, 1865 (14 Stat. 687). That article is as follows:——
The words in brackets are an amendment adopted by the senate, 26th June, 1866, which the Indians accepted Sept. 21 of that year. The treaty was proclaimed Jan. 21, 1867.
On the 3d of March, 1863, Congress passed 'An Act for a grant of lands to the State of Kansas, in alternate sections, to aid in the construction of certain railroads and telegraphs in said State' (12 Stat. 772); the first section of which is as follows:——
- The legislature of Kansas, on the 9th of February, 1864, passed an act accepting the grant; and designated the appellant to build the road from Leavenworth to the southern line of the State, and to receive the grant of land upon the prescribed terms and conditions. Its authorized route passed through the Osage lands whereof mention is made in the first article of the treaty of 1865, and a map of the definite location of the road was filed in the General Land-Office, Jan. 2, 1868.
The Commissioner of the General Land-Office, by letter bearing date Jan. 21, 1868, directed the register and receiver of the proper office to withdraw from sale the odd-numbered sections within ten miles of the line of the road.
The fourth section of the law making appropriations for the Indian Department, approved March 3, 1863 (12 Stat. 793), is as follows:——
'That the President of the United States be, and is hereby, authorized to enter into treaties with the several tribes of Indians, respectively, now residing in the State of Kansas, for the extinction of their titles to lands held in common within said State, and for the removal of such Indians of said tribes as hold their lands in common to suitable localities elsewhere within the territorial limits of the United States, and outside the limits of any State.'
On the 10th of April, 1869, Congress passed the following joint resolution (16 Stat. 55):——
'Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, That any bona fide settler residing upon any portion of the lands sold to the United States by virtue of the first and second articles of the treaty concluded between the United States and the Great and Little Osage tribe of Indians, September twenty-ninth, eighteen hundred and sixty-five, and proclaimed January twenty-first, eighteen hundred and sixty-seven, who is a citizen of the United States, or shall have declared his intention to become a citizen of the United States, shall be, and hereby is, entitled to purchase the same, in quantity not exceeding one hundred and sixty acres, at the price of one dollar and twenty-five cents per acres, within two years from the passage of this act, under such rules and regulations as may be prescribed by the Secretary of the Interior: Provided, however, that both the odd and even numbered sections of said lands shall be subject to settlement and sale as above provided: And provided further, that the sixteenth and thirty-sixth sections in each township of said lands shall be reserved for State school purposes, in accordance with the provisions of the act of admission of the State of Kansas: Provided, however, that nothing in this act shall be construed in any manner affecting any legal rights heretofore vested in any other party or parties.'
Settlers made entries lying within the odd-numbered sections, which were set aside and vacated, Jan. 16, 1872, by the Secretary of the Interior, who decided that the appellant had a grant within those lands.
The appellant having constructed its road from its initial point to Thayer, within the ceded territory, and about twenty miles south of its northern boundary; and, desiring to charge its previously located route south of that town, the legislature of Kansas, in January, 1871, asked Congress to allow a...
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