UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE

The line of definite location of a railroad, which determines the rights of railroad companies to land under land grant acts of Congress, is definitely filed, within the meaning of those acts, by filing the map of its location with the Commissioner of the General Land Office at Washington.

Under the acts granting lands to aid in the construction of a line of railroad from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean, the claim of a homestead or preemption entry made at any time before the filing of that map in the General Land Office had attached within the meaning of those statutes, and no land to which such right had attached came within the grant.

The subsequent failure of the person making such claim to comply with the acts of Congress concerning residence, cultivation, and building on the land, or his actual abandonment of the claim, does not cause it to revert to the railroad company and become a part of the grant. The claim having attached clubjuris

Page 113 U. S. 630

at the time of filing the definite line of the road, it did not pass by the grant, but was by its express terms excluded, and the company had no interest, reversionary or otherwise, in it.

The Act of July 3, 1866, 14 Stat. 79, which authorized the Secretary of the Interior to withdraw certain lands from sale on filing a map of the general route of the road with him, did not reserve such lands from entry under the preemption and homestead laws.

Suit for breach of covenant of warranty of title to a tract of land in Kansas. Plaintiff in error was defendant below. Its title was derived from grants of public land to aid in the construction of a railway to the Pacific, under the acts of July 1, 1862, 12 Stat. 489; July 2, 1864, 13 Stat. 356, and July 3, 1866, 14 Stat. 79. The tract was within the location of the railroad grants, but was excepted from those grants by reason of a homestead entry and possession. Subsequent to this entry and possession, the party so in possession took title from the railroad company, and the homestead entry was cancelled. The alleged paramount adverse title was derived from a patent from the United States issued on a homestead entry made subsequent to these proceedings. The Supreme Court of Kansas found that there was a breach of the warranty, and rendered judgment accordingly. This writ of error was brought to review that judgment. clubjuris

Page 113 U. S. 632