Morrison Waite

“ It needs no argument to show that the political power cannot be thus ousted of its jurisdictian, and the judiciary set in its place. When a state submits itself, without reservation, to the jurisdiction of a court in a particular case, that jurisdiction may be used to give full effect to what the state has by its act of submission allowed to be done ”

“ The money in the treasury is the property of the state, and not in any legal sense the property of the bond or coupon holders. If lost or destroyed, the loss will fall alone on the state or its agents, and the bondholders will be entitled to payment in full from other sources. ”

“ It is insisted, however, that the money in the treasury collected from the tax levied for the year 1879 constitutes a trust fund of which the individual defendants are ex officio trustees, and that they may be enjoined as such trustees from diverting it from the purposes to which it was pledged under the contract. The individual defendants are the several officers of the state, who, under the law, compose the board of liquidation. That board is, in no sense, a custodian of this fund. Its duty was to negotiate the exchange of the new bonds for the old on the terms proposed. ”

“ The bonds and coupons which the parties to these suits hold, have not been reduced to judgment, and there is no way in which the state, in its capacity as an organized political community, can be brought before any court of the state, or of the United States, to answer a suit in the name of these holders to obtain such a judgment. ”

“ The said bonds shall be a valid obligation of the state in favor of any holder thereof, and no court shall enjoin the payment of the principal or interest thereof or the levy and collection of tax therefor; to secure such levy, collection, and payment, the judicial power shall be exercised when necessary. ”

“ On the first day of January, 1880, a new constitution of Louisiana went into effect. A portion of that constitution, called the 'Debt Ordinance,' is in these words:
'STATE DEBT.
'Article 1. Be it ordained by the people of the state of Louisiana, in convention assembled, that the interest to be paid on the consolidated bonds of the state of Louisiana be and is hereby fixed at 2 per cent. per annum for 5 years from the first day of January, 1880, 3 per cent. per annum for 15 years, and and 4 per cent. per annum thereafter, payable semi-annually ”