Samuel Freeman Miller

“ If there be any informality in the attempt of the secretary of the interior and of the state of Kansas to confer upon the railroad company the legal title to these lands, it is for the company to seek relief, and to have those informalities corrected, not for the United States to set aside its solemn instruments in which those rights are evidenced, and under which not only the railroad company then interested, but its grantee, the present appellant, holds these lands or has sold them to innocent purchasers. ”

“ If, at the time that the act of 1866 was passed, the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe Railroad Company, or any other company than the one to which the grant of 1866 was made, was intending to build a road, or expected to build one, or had any authority from the state of Kansas to build one, under the acts of 1863 and 1864, the argument would have force. ”

“ In support of this view of the subject, it must appear to any thinking mind that the grant of lands to the Missouri, Kansas & Texas Railroad Company would not be defeated if the other road from the north did not build into the valley of the Neosho river at all, and yet, if the strict and literal construction of the phrase, 'where that road enters the valley,' should be adopted, that would be the effect upon the grant. ”