Knepper v. Sands

Syllabus

<p>Section 4 of the act of March 3, 1887, 24 Stat. 556, for the adjustment of forfeited railroad grants' providing for issuing patents under the conditions specified for lands sold by the grantee company to purchasers in good faith, has no reference to any unearned lands purchased after the date of the act from a company to which they had never been certified or patented, although such company might have acquired an interest in them had it completed its road. Nor can one who purchased unearned lands from a grantee company whose grant was made by .Congress through the State in which its road was to be built, be regarded as a purchaser in good faith, within the meaning of the act of 1887, when the purchase was made after the passage of the act and after the State had, by legislative enactment, resumed its title to the' lands and then relinquished them to the United States on account of the failure to complete its road.</p>