OCR Text |
Show 64 REPORT OF THE COMMIBSIONER OF INDIAN AFFAIRS. new Btste waa held temporarily and in trust for the new State to be thereafter ere-sted, and that such State, when oreatad, by virtue of its being poeaessed the same rights and juriridiction an had the original States. And, replying to en argument based UDOn the assum~tion that the United States had acaoired the whole of Ala-bama frolot Spain, tila court observed that tilo United Stnres muold then i~avall old i t sctbiect to the Conntitt~tioua nd law8 of its own Government. Tile wort dcclured (p. 229) that to refuse to concede to Alsbama sovereignty and jurisdiction over all the tomitory within her limits wonld be to "deny that Alabams, haa been admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the original States." The same principle^ were applied in Louisiana v. First Munioipality (3 How., 589). In Withers zr. Buekley, 20 Haw., 84 (1857), it was held that a statute of Mississippi oreating commissioners for a riverwithin the State and presoribine their powers and duties Was within the legitimate and essential powers of the State. In answer to the contention that the statute eonflictsd with the act of Congress whichauthorized the people of Mississippi Territory to form a constitution, in that it was inconsist-entwith the proviaion in the aot that "the navigable rivers andwaters leading into thesamesh&Il be common highways, and forever free, as well to the inhahitents of the State of Mississippi as to other citizens of the United Stetas," the conrt ssid (p. 92) : "In considerine this act of Conereas of March 1. 1817. it is unneossaam to insti-tnta soyeva!uiuuriott or rritieiatn BR to it$ lepitimnrt, tuuaning,or owratiuo,or bind-ingantl~ urity, farther than to aflirm that it could Lave no oNeot to resrrirt rlaenow St& in any of its neoesaory attributes as an independent sovereign government, nor to inhibit or diminish its perfect eqnality with the other member8 of the eon-federacy with whioh it ws9 to be associated. These conelasions follow from the verynatnre and objeots of the eonfederaoy, from the langnage of the Constitution adopted by tile Ststes, and from the rule of interpretation pronounced by this court in the ease of Pollsrd's Lessee a. Hagan (3 How.,223)." A like ruling was made in Escenaba Co. s. Chicago, 107 U. S., 678 (1882). where provisions of the ordinance of 1787 were claimed to operate to deprive the Stat" of Illinois of the power to authorize the oonatruotion of bridges over navigable rivers within the State. The court, through Mr. Jnatios Field, said (p. 683): "But thestates have foll power to regulate withintheir limits matters oEinterna1 polioa, including in that general designstion whatever will promote the peace, cam-fort, oonvenience, snd prosperity of their people." And it Was further sdded (p. 688) : Whstever the limitation upon her power8 as a goverqment whilst in a Territori~l condition, whether from the ordinance of 1787 or the 1e.g.i slstion of Cong-r ess, i t oeased to have any operative force, except as volnntarily adopted by her, after ahe became a State of the Union. On her admission she at once became entitled to and possessed of dl the right6 of dominion and sovereignty which belonged to the orig-inal States. She Was admitted, and could be admitted, only on the same footing with them. " * Equality of the oonetitutional right and power is the oondi-tion of all the States of the Union, old and new." In Cardwell v. American Bridge Company, 113 3. S., 205 (1884), Esaanaha Com-psny u. Chicago, supra, wss followed, and it was held that a clause in the act admit-ting California into the Union whioh provided that the navigable waters within the Stste shell be free to citizen8 of the United Ststes in no way impaired the power which the State could exeroise over the subject if the claose in question had no existenoe. Mr. Justice Field oonolnded the opinion of the court an followa (p. 212) : "The act sdmitting California declares that she is 'admitted into the Union on an equal footing with the origins1 States in all respeots whatever.' She was not, there-fore, shorn by the clause as to navigable water within her limits of any of the powers which the original Ststes possessed over such waters within their limits." A like oonolnsion was applied in the 0889 of Willamette Iron Bridge Co. u. Hatch (125 U. S., I), where the e.ot admitting the State of Oregon into the Union was constraed. |