Henry Billings Brown

“ The acts in this case, though similar, are not identical, and there is certainly some ground for saying that the construction of the two should not be the same. The point made by the plaintiffs in error that the decision in Beveridge v. Livingstone was made retroactive is answered by the fact that courts are bound, in their very nature, to declare what the law is and has been, and not what it shall be in the future, and that, if they were absolutely bound by their prior decisions, they would be without the power to correct their own errors. ”

“ But even if it were conceded that defendants had a right to rely upon the supreme court giving to the act of 1872 the same construction it had placed upon the act of 1863, that construction was nothing more than that the board of supervisors had a discretion to extend the time for the performance of the contract after the time originally limited had expired. ”