Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/680

 668 FEDERAL EBPORTEB. �3. Bame—Validitt— Change op Judiciaz Rulino. �Hdd,fuHher, that if such bonds constituted a valid contract when made, as the law and the constitution were tben expouuded by the supreme court of the state, that it did not cease to be such because the higheat court of the state had afterwards changed its ruiing. �Odplce V. Œty of Dubuque, 1 Wall. 175. �4. 'WiscoiisiK— Statutb! of Limitations.— [Ed. �Deummond, g. J. The law and facts of this case, by stipu- lation between the parties, bave been left to the court. The suit was originally brought in the state court, and transferred to this court. It is an action on four bonds of $500 each, numbered 5, 6, 7, and 8, issued by the defendant, and made payable to the Fox Eiver Valley Eailroad Company, on the first of November, 1856, under the authority of an act of the legislature of March 15, 1856, and found in chapter 138 of the Local and Private Laws of Wisconsin of that year. That act authorized several towns in the county of Eacine, Eoches- ter among others, to subscribe to the capital stock of the Fox Eiver Valley Eailroad Company, and pay for the same, in the bonds of the town, — the town of Eochester, — the sum of $15,- 000. The only objection taken to the bonds as not being in accordance with the statute is that they do not appear to have been issued by the board of supervisors. The seventh section of the statute declared that the bonds were to be signed by the chairman of the board of supervisors, ànd eountersigned by the town clerk ; and these bonds appear to be strictly in conformity with the requirements of the statute; and the presumption must be that they were issued under the authority of the board of supervisors. �John M. Thompson was a contractor on the railroad, and these bonds were indorsed and transferred to him by the rail- road Company in payment for work done upon the road. There is much confliet in the testimony as to the subsequent disposition and ownership of these bonds. They were at one time held by the Bank of Alfred, Maine, as collateral security for a loan made to Thompson; and in consequence of that indebtedness being discharged or satisfied by Jeremiah M. Mason, the bonds appear to bave come into his hands. ����