Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 1.djvu/762

 754 KEDEEAL EBPORTEB. �the court would have said : "You must corne into this tribunal with clean hands; you must do equity before you can seek the aid of a court of conscience." �The contention of the railroad company is that it should be permitted to take possession of the property in controversy without process or legal proceedings. While I am clear that the contracts under which the property is held by plaintiff are ultra vires, there is a dispute upon that subject, and such a dispute as in my judgment cannot be determined by the railroad company of its own motion. �The right of rescission does not justify the railroad com- pany in taking possession ezcept by lawful means. The plaintiff has a right to be heard upon issue joined in a proper proceeding before being ejected. The present question is not ■whether the contracts should be rescinded and the property restored to the railroad company, but whether this should be done by the railroad company upon its own motion, and in a way to deprive the plaintiff not only of a hearing in the regu- lar course of this court, but also deprive it of the right of appeal. �It is one thing for me to hold that the contracts are in my judgment ultra vires, and quite another to say to the railroad company, "You may tum the plaintiff out and take posses- sion without giving it a day in court." �An injunction will often be granted to restrain a party from deciding for himself a question involving controverted rights, and to compel him to resort to the courts, and this without regard to the absolute merits of the controversy. It is enough that there is a controversy to justify a court of equity in direct- ing that it be settled by legal proceedings. Eckelkamp v. Schroeder, 45 Mo. 505 ; Varick v. New York, e John. Ch. 53 ; Dudley V. Trustees, 12. B. Monroe, 610; Farmers v. Beno, 53 Pa. St. 224; Sunsing v. Steamboat Co. 7 John. Ch. 162. �The prineiple settled by these and many other cases is that a party who is in actual possession of property, claiming under color of title, is not to be ousted, except by the means provided by law, and such a possession the court will protect by in- junction from disturbance by any other means. For this ��� �