Argument for Defendant in Error.

sioners under the act of 1851. This proposition would seem to be fully settled in the Supreme Court of the State in Minturn v. Brower, 24 Cal. 644. The decision in that case is mentioned with approval in Stevenson v. Bennett, 35 Cal. 424, 431; Steinbach v. Moore, 30 Cal. 499, 507; Seale v. Ford, 29 Cal. 104, 107; Banks v. Moreno, 39 Cal. 233, 237.

The case of Minturn v. Brower was very carefully, thoroughly and elaborately considered by the court; and the doctrine there laid down that it was not the intent of the act of March 3d, 1851, for the settlement of private land claims in California, to require persons holding perfect titles to lands in California to present them to the land commission provided for by that act for confirmation; and that the holders of such titles could not be required to present them for confirmation, under the penalty of forfeiture of their titles for failure so to present them, would seem to be sustainable upon well-recognized principles of constitutional law. Those principles have often been stated by this court in cases involving questions of title derived from foreign governinents; and have sometimes been applied by the court to cases presenting features similar to those in this case. We will hereafter refer to some of those cases.

We think that there would never have been any doubt upon this question, were it not for certain dicta in Fremont v. United States, 17 How. 542; United States v. Fossatt, 21 How. 445; and More v. Steinbach, 127 U. S. 70, to the effect that the act of 1851 required the holders of all titles derived from the Spanish or Mexican Governments, whether perfect or imperfect, to present them to the land commission for confirmation; that the requirement of the act extended not only to the holders of equitable, inchoate or imperfect titles, but also to the holders of perfect titles.

This court in United States v. Moreno, 1 Wall. 400, and Beard v. Federy, 3 Wall. 478, and the Supreme Court of the State in Estrada v. Murphy, 19 Cal. 248, carefully save perfect titles from the construction given in those cases to the act of 1851, holding only that the act required the presentation to the land commission, of imperfect titles—such titles as were involved in those cases.

Argument for Defendant in Error.

The treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo preserved the rights of property then held by Mexican citizens in the ceded territory. This placed them on the same footing as citizens of the United States. See United States v. Percheman, 7 Pet. 51; United States v. Clarke, 8 Pet. 436, 465; United States v. Wiggins, 14 Pet. 334, 349; United States v. Arredondo, 6 Pet. 691; Henderson v. Poindexter, 12 Wheat. 530, 543; United States v. Reynes, 9 How. 127, 144; Dent v. Emmeger, 14 Wall. 308, as to titles under the cessions of Florida and Louisiana, where a like doctrine has been held.

Congress had no power, under the Constitution, to require the presentation of perfect titles to the board of land commissioners, under the penalty of forfeiture of the land.

This point was not presented in Minturn v. Brower, ubi supra, at least, not in the form now attempted. The State, upon its admission into the Union, succeeded-as was said of Alabama-to all the rights of sovereignty, jurisdiction and eminent domain. Pollard v. Hagan, 3 How. 212.

The State has all the powers pertaining to sovereignty, except as limited by the Constitution of the United States. All persons and property were subject to its dominion. It has authority to provide for the acquisition, tenure and transmission of titles to property. It regulates domestic relations, trusts, agencies and the like. It possesses the right of eminent domain, and all escheats vest in the State. The State has the ultimate jurisdiction over persons and things, except as limited by the Constitution of the United States. New York v. Miller, 11 Pet. 185.

The Colonization Law of 1824, and the Regulations of 1828, were, after their adoption, and until superseded by the treaty of cession, the only laws in force regarding the granting of public lands in California. United States v. Vallejo, 1 Black, 541; United States v. Workman, 1 Wall. 745; United States v. Osio, 23 How. 273.

Those laws provided the means for the acquisition of the entire and perfect title by the persons who should petition for grants of lands.

The court will take judicial notice of the laws of Mexico re

VOL. CXXX-16

Opinion of the Court.

lating to the granting of public lands. United States v. Turner, 11 How. 663; Fremont v. United States, 17 How. 542; United States v. Perot, 98 U. S. 428; Payne v. Treadwell, 16 Cal. 221. And they will take notice of those laws, as they would of a state law of California for the sale of the public lands of the State, and under which lands have been sold, but which was afterwards repealed, upon the adoption of a new law upon the same subject.

It must be remembered that the United States is and stands, in respect to its lands, as a private proprietor, except that it is not subject to state taxation, or the Statutes of Limitation, or the statutes regarding conveyances, and enjoys perhaps some other immunities. If Congress can forfeit our lands twenty years after our title became perfect, we cannot perceive why it cannot provide for another forfeiture twenty years after the issue of the patent under the act of 1851; that is to say, unless for some undiscovered reason, the title issued by the United States is better entitled to protection than one issued by the predecessor or grantor of the United States. It is said in Fletcher v. Peck, 6 Cranch, 87, that a State cannot annul her grant of lands. It is equally clear that she cannot annul a grant made by her predecessor. It is also clear that the United States cannot annul a grant, valid when made, whether made by the State or its predecessor. The claim of such a power is repugnant to the Constitution of the United States.

MR. JUSTICE MILLER delivered the opinion of the court.

The principal error assigned, and the only one necessary to be considered here, is in the following language:

"The court erred in holding that under the said act of Congress of March 3d, 1851, it was not necessary for each and every person claiming lands in California, by virtue of any right or title derived from the Spanish or Mexican governments, to present such claim to the board of land commissioners under said act."

The question presented is an important one in reference to land titles in the State of California, and is entitled to our

Opinion of the Court.

serious consideration. Although it has been generally supposed that nearly all the private claims to any of the lands acquired by the United States from Mexico, by the treaty of peace made at the close of the Mexican war, have been presented to and passed upon by the board of commissioners appointed for that purpose by the act of 1851, yet claims are now often brought forward which have not been so passed upon by that board, and were never presented to it for consideration. And if the proposition on which the Supreme Court of California decided this case is a sound one, namely, that the board constituted under that act had no jurisdiction of, and could not by their decree affect in any manner, a title which had been perfected under the laws of the Mexican government prior to the transfer of the country to the United States, it is impossible to tell to what extent such claims of perfected titles may be presented, even in cases where the property itself has by somebody else been brought before that board and passed upon.

The proposition seems to have been occasionally the subject of comment in the Supreme Court of California in the early days, after the land commission had ceased to exist, and it has also been frequently considered in decisions of this court of the same period. It is urged very forcibly by counsel for the plaintiff in error that this court has fully decided against it in several well considered cases, and that previous to the case of Minturn v. Brower, 24 Cal. 644, the decisions, or at least the intimations, of the Supreme Court of California were also against the doctrine.

By the treaty of peace, known as that of Guadalupe Hidalgo, of February 2, 1848, 9 Stat. 922, which closed the controversies and the war between the United States and Mexico, a cession was made of a very large territory by the government of Mexico to the government of the United States. This was a transfer of the political dominion and of the proprietary interest in this land, but the government of Mexico caused to be inserted in the instrument certain provisions intended for the protection of private property owned by Mexicans within this territory at the time the treaty was made; and it may be con

Opinion of the Court.

ceded that the obligation of the United States to give such protection, both by this treaty and by the law of nations, was perfect.

That portion of this territory which afterwards became a part of the United States under the designation of the State of California had been taken possession of during the war, in the year 1846. Most of it was in a wild state of nature, with very few resident white persons, and very little land cultivated within its limits. Article 11 of the treaty describes it in the following language:

"Considering that a great part of the territories which, by the present treaty, are to be comprehended for the future within the limits of the United States, is now occupied by savage tribes, who will hereafter be under the exclusive control of the government of the United States, and whose incursions within the territory of Mexico would be prejudicial in the extreme, it is solemnly agreed that all such incursions shall be forcibly restrained by the government of the United States, whensoever this may be necessary."

This extract from the treaty shows the character of the country which was acquired by the United States under that instrument.

Very soon after the American army took possession of California in 1846, it was discovered that rich mines of the precious metals were abundant in that country, and a rush of emigration almost unparalleled in history to that region commenced, which was continued from that time on for many years. It was in this condition, as to population, of the territory itself, with a proprietary title in the United States to a vast region of country included within its limits, in which miners, ranchmen, settlers under the Mexican church authorities and claimants under Mexican grants were widely scattered, that the State of California was admitted into the Union, and the necessity was presented for ascertaining by some means the validity of the claims of private individuals within its boundaries, and to establish them as distinct from the lands which belonged to the government. To this end Congress passed a statute on the 3d day of March, 1851, en