Henry Billings Brown

“ The United States recovered judgment against Morrison, upon which a fl. fa. was issued, goods taken in execution, and restored to the debtor under a forthcoming bond. This bond having been forfeited, an execution was awarded thereon by the judgment of the district court rendered April, 1822, which it was asserted created a lien upon the lands, and overreached certain conveyances under which the defendants claimed, dated February and March, 1823. The circuit court was of opinion that the lien did not overreach these conveyances. ”

“ All counties and cities bordering on the coast of the Gulf of Mexico are hereby authorized, upon a vote of two-thirds of the taxpayers therein, (to be ascertained as may be provided by law,) to levy and collect such tax for construction of sea walls, breakwaters or sanitary purposes, as may be authorized by law, and may create a debt for such works and issue bonds in evidence thereof. ”

“ In the earliest of them (City of Terrell v. Dessaint [1888] 71 Tex. 770, 9 S. W. 593) , which was an action on a promissory note given by the city in payment for material for waterworks supplies, it was squarely held that the last clause of section 7, above quoted, must be held to apply to all cities alike, and that the clause contained no word or words which restricted its application to the cities previously mentioned in the same section. ”

“ It is quite evident that if this case had been decided and called to the attention of the courts below, the validity of the bonds involved in this action would have been sustained, and the main question involved in this case is whether we shall give effct to this decision of the supreme court of Texas, pronounced since the case under consideration was decided in the courts below, and giving, as is claimed, at least, a somewhat different construction to the constitution of the state.
We do not ourselves perceive any such inconsistency between the case of Mitchell Co. v. City Nat. ”