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Opinion of the Court.

subscription. But within any just interpretation of the words of the statutes, the power of townships to act would come into existence, not only by a direct refusal of the commissioners to submit the question of subscription to popular vote, but upon their failure within a reasonable time to call an election for that purpose. Shoemaker v. Goshen Township, supra.

The first annual election in townships after the passage of the act of March 21st, 1850,-which act, by reference to that of 1846, contemplated that the question of subscription would be determined at an annual election-was on the first Monday in April of that year. No submission, however, of that question could have been ordered for that election, because it occurred within twenty days after the passage of the act of 1850. The short time intervening between those dates prevented the requisite notice being given; consequently, the first annual election in townships at which the county commissioners could, under that act, have taken the sense of the electors, was that fixed by law for the second Tuesday of October, 1850. Did the mere failure to submit the question of a county subscription at the lastnamed election justify the township in claiming that the commissioners had not been authorized by a vote of the county to make a subscription? Were townships, from and after that date, and solely because of such failure, invested with power to move in the matter of subscriptions to the stock of this company? These questions we deem it unnecessary to determine; for, if answered in the affirmative, it still appears that no such power was in fact exercised by Porter Township prior to the passage of the act of March 25th, 1851; by which act, as correctly adjudged by the Supreme Court of Ohio in Shoemaker v. Goshen Township, the former statutes were so far modified as not only to renew the power of county commissioners to subscribe for the stock of this company, if thereunto authorized by the voters at a special election, but in language more direct and specific than employed in former statutes, to make the authority of townships to subscribe depend upon the county commissioners not having been authorized to make a county subscription. The general assembly of Ohio, it must be presumed, knew at the passage of the act of March 25th, 1851, what particular

Opinion of the Court.

counties and townships had then made subscriptions to the stock of this railroad company. That act was passed with reference to the situation as it actually was. When, therefore, upon the basis of non-authorization of the commissioners to make a county subscription, it was provided, in the act of March 25th, 1851, that "then, and in that case" townships might subscribe, it must have been intended that the authority of any township, which had not then acted, to subscribe should exist only where, after the passage of the latter act, a county subscription had been negatived either by a vote of the people or by the refusal or failure of the commissioners within a reasonable time to submit the question to a popular vote. If this be not so, then Porter Township would have been authorized in its discretion to vote on a proposition to subscribe either at the annual election in April, 1851, or at any special election thereafter held, notwithstanding the county may have previously made a subscription. But such we cannot suppose to be a correct interpretation of the statute. Consequently, from and after March 25th, 1851, it was apparent from the terms of the act of that date that Porter Township had no legal authority to make a subscription of stock, except in the contingency-which the township could not control, but of which it and all others were bound to take notice-t..at the commissioners had not been authorized to subscribe for the county. So far from that contingency ever arising, the commissioners (before the township election was called) had been authorized by popular vote to subscribe, and they did in fact subscribe, the sum of $50,000. It cannot, therefore, be said that the commissioners were not authorized by a vote of the county to subscribe at the time Porter Township voted; consequently, the latter was without legal authority to make a subscription. This conclusion is satisfactory to our minds, and is, besides, sustained by the decision of the Supreme Court of Ohio in Hopple v. Trustees of Brown Township in Delaware County, 13 Ohio St. 311, reaffirmed in Hopple v. Hipple, 33 Ohio St. 116.

It is, however, contended, that by the settled doctrines of this court, the township is estopped by the recitals of the bonds in suit, to make its present defence. The bonds, upon their

Opinion of the Court.

face, purport to have been issued "in pursuance of the provisions of the several acts of the general assembly of the State of Ohio, and of a vote of the qualified electors in said township of Porter, taken in pursuance thereof." These recitals, counsel argue, import a compliance, in all respects, with the law, and, therefore, the township will not be allowed, against a bona fide holder for value, to say that the circumstances did not exist which authorized it to issue the bonds. It is not to be denied that there are general expressions in some former opinions which, apart from their special facts, would seem to afford support to this proposition in the general terms in which it is presented. But this court said in Cohens v. Virginia, 6 Wheat. 264, and again in Carroll v. Lessee of Carroll, 16 How. 275, 287, that it was "a maxim not to be disregarded that general expressions, in every opinion, are to be taken in connection with the case in which those expressions are used. If they go beyond the case, they may be respected, but ought not to control the judgment in a subsequent suit when the very point is presented for decision." An examination of the cases, in which those general expressions are found, will show that the court has never intended to adjudge that mere recitals by the officers of a municipal corporation in bonds issued in aid of a railroad corporation precluded an inquiry, even where the rights of a bona fide holder were involved, as to the existence of legislative authority to issue them.

A reference to a few of the adjudged cases will serve to illustrate the rule which has controlled the cases involving the validity of municipal bonds. In Commissioners of Knox County v. Aspinwall, 21 How. 539, power was given to county commissioners to subscribe stock to be paid for by county bonds, in aid of a railroad corporation, the power to be exercised if the electors, at an election duly called, should approve the subscription. It was adjudged that as the power existed, and since the statute committed to the board of commissioners authority to decide whether the election was properly held, and whether the subscription was approved by a majority of the electors, the recital in bonds executed by those commissioners, that they were issued in pursuance of the statute giving the

Opinion of the Court.

power, estopped the county from alleging or proving, to the prejudice of a bona file holder, that requisite notices of the election had not been given. In Bissell v. City of Jeffersonville, 24 How. 287, the court found that there was power to issue the bonds, and that after they were issued and delivered to the railroad company it was too late, as against a bona fide holder, to call in question the determination of the facts, which the law prescribed as the basis of the exercise of the power granted, and which the city authorities were authorized and required to determine before bonds were issued:

Probably the fullest statement of the settled doctrine of this court is found in Town of Coloma v. Eaves, 92 U. S. 484. In that case the authority to make the subscription was made, by the statute, to depend upon the result of the submission of the question to a popular vote, and its approval by a majority of the legal votes cast. But whether the statute in these particulars was complied with, was left to the decision of certain persons who held official relations with the municipality in whose behalf the proposed subscription was to be made. It was in reference to such a case that the court said: "When legislative authority has been given to a municipality, or to its officers, to subscribe to the stock of a railroad company, and to issue municipal bonds in payment, but only on some precedent condition, such as a popular vote favoring the subscription, and where it may be gathered from the legislative enactment that the officers of the municipality were invested with power to decide whether the condition precedent has been complied with, their recital that it has been, made in the bonds issued by them and held by a bona fide purchaser, is conclusive of the fact and binding upon the municipality; for the recital is itself a decision of the fact by the appointed tribunal." This doctrine was reaffirmed in Buchanan v. Litchfield, 102 U. S. 278, and in other cases, and we perceive no just ground to doubt its correctness, or to regard it as now open to question in this court.

But we are of opinion that the rule as thus stated does not support the position which counsel for plaintiff in error take in the present case. The adjudged cases, examined in the light of their special circumstances, show that the facts which a munic

Opinion of the Court.

ipal corporation, issuing bonds in aid of the construction of a railroad, was not permitted, against a bona fide holder, to question, in face of a recital in the bonds of their existence, were those connected with or growing out of the discharge of the ordinary duties of such of its officers as were invested with authority to execute them, and which the statute conferring the power made it their duty to ascertain and determine before the bonds were issued; not merely for themselves, as the ground of their own action, in issuing the bonds, but, equally, as authentic and final evidence of their existence, for the information and action of all others dealing with them in reference to it. Such is not the case before us. Had the statutes of Ohio conferred upon a township in Delaware County authority to make a subscription to the stock of this company, upon the approval of the voters at an election previously held, then a recital, by its proper officers, such as is found in the bonds in suit, would have estopped the township from proving that no election was in fact held, or that the election was not called and conducted in the mode prescribed by law; for in such case it would be clear that the law had referred to the officers of the township, not only the ascertainment, but the decision of the facts involved in the mode of exercising the power granted. But in this case, as we have seen, power in townships to subscribe did not come into existence, that is, did not exist, except where the county commissioners had not been authorized to make a subscription. Whether they had not been so authorized, that is, whether the question of subscription had or not been submitted to a county vote, or whether the county commissioners had failed for so long a time to take the sense of the people as to show that they had not, within the meaning of the law, been authorized to make a subscription, were matters with which the trustees of the township, in the discharge of their ordinary duties, had no official connection, and which the statute had not committed to their final determination. Granting that the recital in the bonds that they were issued "in pursuance of the provisions of the several acts of the general assembly of Ohio," is equivalent to an express recital that the county commissioners had not been authorized by a vote of the county to subscribe to the stock of

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