o said
lands and to remove all clouds from its title thereto.

One result of this legislation, if consummated and if effectual, would
be to restore to the United States, as a part of the public domain,
lands which more than twenty-five years ago the Government expressly
granted and surrendered, and which repeated decisions of the Supreme
Court have adjudged to belong by virtue of this action of the Government
to other parties.

Another result would be not only to validate claims to this land which
our highest judicial tribunal have solemnly declared to be invalid, but
to actually direct the issue of patents in confirmation of said claims.

Still another result would be to oblige the Government of the United
States to enter the courts ostensibly to assert and protect its title to
said land, while in point of fact it would be used to enforce private
claims to the same and unsettle private ownership.

It is by no means certain that this proposed legislation, relating to a
subject peculiarly within the judicial function, and which attempts to
disturb rights and interests thoroughly intrenched in the solemn
adjudications of our courts, would be upheld. In any event, it seems to
me that it is an improper exercise of legislative power, an interference
with the determinations of a coordinate branch of the Government, an
arbitrary annulment of a public grant made more than twenty-five years
ago, an attempted destruction of vested rights, and a threatened
impairment of lawful contracts.

The advocates of this measure insist that a point in favor of the
settlers upon these lands and important in the consideration of this
bill is found in the following language of the constitution of the State
of Iowa, which was adopted in 1857:

The general assembly shall not locate any of the public lands which have
been or may be granted by Congress to this State, and the location of
which may be given to the general assembly, upon lands actually settled,
without the consent of the occupant.

The State under its constitution was perfectly competent to take the
grants of 1861 and 1862. The clause of the constitution above quoted
deals expressly with "lands which have been or may be granted by
Congress to the State," and thus of necessity recognizes its right to
take such grants. This competency in the State as a grantee was all that
was needed to create, under the joint resolution of 1861 and the act of
1862, a complete divestit