Great Northern Railway Co. v. Hower

Citations

• 236 U.S. 702
• 35 S. Ct. 465
• 59 L. Ed. 798
• 1915 U.S. LEXIS 1714

Syllabus

<p>Bona fide purchase is an affirmative defense which the grantee must set Up in order to defeat the claim of one seeking to have a trust declared in lands patented, if the bill is otherwise sufficient.</p> <p>Rev. Stat., § 2291, is specific in its requirements that in order to obtain a patent for a homestead, the applicant must have actually resided upon or cultivated the same for a term of five years.</p> <p>While the law deals tenderly with one going in good faith on the public lands, with a view of making a home thereon, the right is a statutory one, and, in such á case as this,- it is essential to show compliance with the statute as a prerequisite to obtaining a patent.</p> <p>Although acting in good faith, settlement upon land other than that included in the entry is not sufficient; and in this case so held as to an entry for one quarter-section where the entryman, through mistake, built his home on another quarter-section and at a point about one-quarter of a mile from the land entered, notwithstanding he did make a trail and build a stable on the land entered.</p>