United States v. Oregon & California Railroad

Citations

• 176 U.S. 28
• 20 S. Ct. 261
• 44 L. Ed. 358
• 1900 U.S. LEXIS 1716

Syllabus

<p>By the act of July 2, 1864, 13 Stat. 365, c. 217, Congress granted lands to the Northern Pacific Railroad Company to aid in the construction of a railroad and telegraph lipe from a point on Lake Superior in Wisconsin or Minnesota to some point on Puget Sound, with a branch via the valley of the Columbia River to a point at or near Portland in the State of Oregon. The grant-was of “every alternate section of public land, not mineral, designated by odd numbers, to the amount of twenty alternate sections per mile on each side of said railroad line as said company may adopt through the Territories of the United States, and ten alternate sections of land per mile on each side of said railroad whenever it passes through any State, and whenever, on the line thereof, the United States have full title, not reserved, sold, granted or otherwise appropriated, and free from preemption, or other claims or rights, at the time the line of said roa<J is definitely fixed, and a plat thereof filed in the office of the Commissioner of the General Land Office; and whenever, prior to said time, any of said sections or parts of sections shall have been granted, sold, reserved, occupied by homestead settlers, or preempted, or otherwise disposed of, other lands shall be selected by said company in lieu thereof, under the direction of the Secretary of the Interior, in alternate sections, and designated by odd numbers, not more than ten miles beyond the limits of said alternate sections.” In March, 1863, the president of that company filed in the Land Department a map which if of value for any purpose was only a map of “ general route,” not one of definite location between Wallula and Portland. That map was not accepted. By act of July 25, 1866, 14 Stat. 239, c. 242, Congress made a grant of land in aid of the construction of a railroad and telegraph line between Portland, Oregon, and the Central Pacific Railroad in California. That grant was in the usual terms employed in such acts. Subse