Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 5.djvu/885

 GARRETT ». Orrï OF MEMPHIS. 818 �to be invalid as impairing the obligation of the contract. It is not of Buch taxes, constituting the consideration of con- tracts, 'that we are speaking, but of ordinary taxes author- ized for the support of govemment, or to meet some special expenditure; and these, until coUected — being mere imposts of the gôvernment, created and continuing only by the will of the legislature^have none of the elements of property whicb canbe seized like debts by attachment or other judicial pro- cess, and subjected to the payment of creditera of the dissolved corporation. They are in no proper sense of the term assets of the corporation." �This expositioiï of the la^vr by Mr. Justice Field accords with the English authorities. But it must bô remembereS that the power of the English parliament is, in matters of this kind, unrestricted by any cdnstitutional limitation. With us it is qaite different. The framers of the federal and state constitution understood the dangers incident to unlimit'ed legislative power, and endeavored, by constitutional restric- tions, to restrain its exercise, and to this end a prohibition upon the states from passing laws impairing the obligation of contracts was inserted in the first, and ample provision made in the last for the protection of vested rights of indi- viduals against legislative encroachments. Under the state constitution, municipal corporations may be modified or re- pealed ; but, to prevent any possible invasion of private rights, it is further declared that no such modifications or repeal shall divest vested rights. Now these important constitu- tional guaranties have been frequent subjects of discussion before the courts, where they bave been generally sustained and enforced. A reference to a few of these will suffice for present purposes. �"The laws," say the supreme court of the United States in Von Hoffman v. City of Quincy, 4 Wall. 535, "which' subsist at the time and place of the making of the cOntifact, and where it is to be performed," in so far as "they aflfect ita validity, construction, discharge, and enforcement," "enter into and f orm a part of it, as if they were expressly referred to- and incorporated in its terms." And, applying the principle- ����