Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 3.djvu/203

 196 FEDERAL REPORTER. �364. The plain meaning of the statute is that the bonds are not to be regarded as issued until delivered under the act by the treasurer of state. Until so delivered they are in escrow, and of this the public has notice in the terms of the law itself. �In Chisholm v. City of Montgomery, 2 Woods, 584-695, Mr. Justice Bradley said: ,"The plea that the city is estopped by the act of ita offieers, by the resolutions of the city coun- cil, or by the negotiable form or other matter in the bonds themselves, from denying the authority of such ofBcers to pledge the faith of the city in aid of said plank roads, and to issue the bonds in question, cannot be maintained. Public offieers cannot acquire authority by declaring that they have it. They cannot thus shut the mouth of the public wham they represent. The offieers and agents of private corpora- tions, entrusted by them with the management of their own business and property, may estop their principals and subject them to the consequences of their unauthorized acts. But the body politic cannot be thus silenced by the acts or declara- tions of its agents. If it could be, unbounded scope would be given to the peculations and frauds of public offieers. I hold it to be a sound proposition, that no municipal or political body can be estopped, by the acts or declarations of its offi- eers, from denying their authority to bind it. The Floyd Acceptances, 1 Wall. 666. Pinally, the plea that the plain- tiffs are hona fide holders of the bonds cannot avail where the defence is want of power to issue them. Of this defect the plaintiffs were bound to take notice. Had the power to issue the bonds existed, and had the question been whether certain preliminary conditions had been complied with, the plea might, under certain circumstances, have been a good one." �If this is the law when an officer of the corporation has ex- eouted his power, a fortiori it is the law of the present case, where the officer who was authorized did not act at ail, and an outsider, for purposes of fraud, undertook to do so. �The conclusion reached renders unnecessary any considera- tion of the questions discussed by counsel., �Judgment for defendants. ����