Page:United States Reports, Volume 209.djvu/386

 360 OCTOBER TERM, 1907. Opinion of the Court. 209 U.S. the consolidation of 1892 under the constitution of 1890, this particular exemption ws not lost. It became, in 1884, a con- crete, vested contract right, acquired on and for a valuable consideration; and as such, it was protected by the contract clause of the Federal Constitution, and also by the Fourteenth Amendment, against subsequent state action. In this instance the right of the old company to transmit the exemption by consolidation, and the power of the consolidated company to tke the exemption, were both specifically contracted for in the year 1884. Even a reservgd power to amend a charter could not lead to this result here claimed. $tearn v. Minnesota, 179 U.S. 223; Ragroad Co, npay v. County, 179 U.S. 302; $nelting Company v. Colorado, 204 U. S. 103. Mr. Hanns Taylor, with whom Mr. George Anderson was on the brief, for appellees. ME. JUSTICE DAY delivered the opinion of the court. The case originated in a bill in equity filed by the Yazoo and Mississippi Valley Railroad Company against the Mayor and Aldermen of the city of Vicksburg, to enjoin the collection of certain municipal taxes on the property of the rslroad com- pany assessed for the year 1901. The bill was demurred to; the court below sustained the de- murrer and rendered a fuml decree dismissing the bill. The case involving constitutional questions, was appealed directly to this court. The allegations of the bill show that on February 22, 1884, the legislature of Mississippi passed an act authorizing the city of Vicksburg to enter into a contract with the Memphis and Vicksburg Railway Company, of which the following is the pertinent ection: "That the city of Vicksburg, through its Board of Mayor and Aldermen, and the Memphis and Vicksburg Railroad Company, or such other railroad as said Memphis and Vicks-

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