Stephen Johnson Field

“ Objections to the jurisdiction of the court below, when they go to the subject-matter of the controversy and not to the form merely of its presentation or to the character of the relief prayed, may be taken at any time. They are not waived because they were not made in the lower court.
The position of the company on this head of jurisdiction is this: that the proceeding to take private property for public use is an exercise by the State of its sovereign right of eminent domain, and with its exercise the United States, a separate sovereignty, has no right to interfere by any of its departments. ”

“ We do not understand that all persons, except the plaintiff in error, were precluded from availing themselves of these lands for the construction of a boom, either on their own account or for general use. ”

“ The property may be appropriated by an act of the legislature, or the power of appropriating it may be delegated to private corporations, to be exercised by them in the execution of works in which the public is interested. ”

“ If the award of the commissioners should not be satisfactory to the company, or to any one claiming an interest in the land, an appeal may be taken to the District Court, where it is to be entered by the clerk 'as a case upon the docket' of the court, the persons claiming an interest in the land being designated as plaintiffs, and the company seeking its condemnation as defendant. ”