UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT DECISIONS ON-LINE

Lands listed to California as indemnity school lands, and patented by the state, are not open to preemption settlement while in possession of the patentee.

The Act of March 1, 1877, 19 Stat. 267, "relating to indemnity school lands in the California," was a full and complete ratification by Congress, according to its terms, of the lists of indemnity school selections which had been before that time certified to the State of California by the United States as indemnity school selections, no matter how defective or insufficient such certificates might originally have been, if the lands included in the lists were not any of those mentioned in § 4, and if they had not been taken up in good faith by a homestead or preemption settler prior to the date of the certificate.

This was an action to recover the possession of land in California, brought and prosecuted to final judgment in the courts of that state. The facts which make the federal case for this court are stated in the opinion of the Court. clubjuris

Page 120 U. S. 367