by John Marshall Harlan

“ While the legislature could not, after the adoption of the constitution of 1869, have legalized a municipal subscription assented to by a less majority of legal voters than is prescribed in that instrument, its power, by retrospective enactment, to confirm and legalize a municipal subscription to the stock of a railroad corporation to which the constitutional majority of electors had assented at an election of which due notice was given, cannot, we think, be successfully disputed. ”

“ It cannot be supposed that the legislature intended to invest the town of Grenada WITH POWER TO MAKE A SUBSCRIPTION WHEN Assented to by two-thirds of the electors voting, and, in the same act, to invest the county with authority to subscribe upon the assent of a bare majority of the electors voting. And yet the argument imputes such diverse purposes to the legislature of the state, if the act of 1871 be construed as authorizing, in violation of the state constitution, a county subscription upon the assent of a bare majority of the electors voting. ”

“ Our conclusion is that the act of 1872, requiring bonds of Grenada county to be issued to the Vicksburg & Nashville Railroad Company, in payment of the subscription voted in 1871 by the constitutional majority of its voters for a railroad from Grenada to Vicksburg, is not in conflict with the constitution of Mississippi. Consequently, there is no ground upon which the county can escape liability upon them to the plaintiffs, who are bona fide holders for value. ”