Horace Gray

“ Land or money, other than current salary or pay, granted by the government to a person entering the military or naval service of the country, has always been called a bounty; and while it is by no means a gratuity, because the promise to grant is one of the considerations for which the soldier or sailor enters the service, yet it is clearly distinguishable from salary or pay measured by the time of service. ”

“ From the very beginning of our existence as a nation, the reward of military service has been treated as a national object and a public use, to which the national domain might justly and lawfully be applied. As new states have been successively formed out of the territory of the United States and admitted into the Union, the acts of admission have reserved, for the making of public highways and other public uses of the state, a twentieth part of the net proceeds of public lands lying within the state, and afterwards sold by the United States. ”

“ Upon full consideration of the question, with the aid of the able arguments of counsel, the court is of opinion that lands disposed of by the United States in satisfaction of military land-warrants are not sold, within the meaning of the statutes upon which the petitioners rely. A sale, in the ordinary sense of the word, is a transfer of property for a fixed price in money or its equivalent. When property or money is transferred or paid as a compensation for service, the property or money may be said to be the price of the service ”