dorsement thereon, required to be paid into a specified bank in the city of Richmond, that being the only mode recognized by law for making such payments; that, at that time, the complainant, being the owner and holder of the requisite amount of coupons for interest, cut from bonds of the state of Virginia, issued under the act of March 20, 1871, entitled "An act to provide for the funding and payment of the public debt," and receivable by virtue thereof in payment of taxes, tendered the same, with coin sufficient exactly to make the required amounts, to the said bank in Richmond, in discharge of said warrants; that said coupons were refused, and the same having been set apart, the complainant brings the same into court, subject to its order in payment of said taxes; that similar tenders were made to the auditor of public accounts, and to the treasurer of state, on the same day, each of whom refused to receive the same; that thereupon the defendant Allen, the auditor of public accounts, proceeded to assess the said railroads upon their real estate, not having any rolling stock, at $20,000 per mile, as being in default for non-payment of the taxes assessed by the board of public works; and placed copies of said assessment in the hands of the defendant Hamilton, as treasurer of Augusta county, for collection, in pursuance of which he levied upon certain cars and locomotives belonging to the complainant, used in operating said railroads, for part of said taxes, and threatens to make further levies upon other cars and engines, to be sold for payment of said taxes so assessed by the auditor of public accounts.

The bill prays for an injunction on the several grounds of irreparable damage; that the acts complained of prevent the proper exercise by the complainant of its franchise, involving a public duty, of operating the railroads of which it is lessee, and in possession; to avoid multiplicity of suits; the want of adequate remedies at law; to remove the cloud upon the title to the railroad property, occasioned by the fact that assessed taxes are a lien thereon; and because it is necessary to protect the complainant in the immunity to which it is entitled, by virtue of the contract with the state of Virginia, secured against state laws impairing its obligation by the constitution of the United States.

It is admitted by the parties in the record that the coupons tendered are genuine, though not verified as required by the act of January 14, 1882. It is also admitted, in like manner, that if the property of the complainant levied on should be sold, "great sacrifice and loss must result therefrom; and that the withdrawal from complainant's use of the amount of rolling stock and machinery levied on and proposed to be sold as aforesaid will cause serious and prolonged embarrassment to complainant's business; that much delay must accrue before such rolling stock and machinery, if sold, can be replaced, and that it will be difficult, if not impracticable, to ascertain and estimate, with even proximate certainty, the losses and damages which would result to complainant from such sale; so that, although the estate of said J. Ed. Hamilton should be sufficient to meet any verdict for damages, in case the sale should be adjudged to have been illegal, the pecuniary value of the complainant's losses and damages could not be properly and adequately ascertained and fixed by the verdict of a jury." There was a final decree in favor of the complainant for a perpetual injunction, as prayed for, and the case is brought here by appeal by the defendants.

The general questions arising and argued in this and other cases involving them are fully discussed in the opinion in the case of Poindexter v. Greenhow, ante, 903. The conclusions reached in that judgment apply to the present appeal, and require that the decree of the circuit court should be affirmed. It is deemed proper to add a few observations on the question of the jurisdiction of the circuit courts, in such cases, in equity, to grant relief by injunction. The circumstances of this case bring it, so far as that remedy is in question, fully within the principle firmly established in this court by the decision in

Osborne v. U. S. Bank, 9 Wheat. 739, and within the terms of the rule as declared in Cummings v. National Bank, 101 U. S. 153, quoted in the case of Poindexter v. Greenhow. The jurisdiction was exercised with energy in behalf of a stockholder in a banking corporation in Dodge v. Woolsey, 18 How. 331, where the refusal of the directors of the company to resist the collection of an unconstitutional tax was made the ground of interposition in behalf of, a stockholder as a breach of trust.

In Board of Liquidation v. McComb, 92 U. S. 531-541, it is said in the opinion of the court, speaking on the question of remedies: "On this branch of the subject, the numerous and well-considered cases heretofore decided by this court leave little to be said. The objections to proceeding against state officers by mandamus or injunction are-First, that it is, in effect, proceeding against the state itself; and, secondly, that it interferes with the official discretion vested in the officers. It is conceded that neither of these things can be done. A state, without its consent, cannot be sued by an individual; and a court cannot substitute its own discretion for that of executive officers in matters belonging to the proper jurisdiction of the latter. But it has been well settled that when a plain official duty, requiring no exercise of discretion, is to be performed, and performance is refused, any person who will sustain personal injury by such refusal may have a mandamus to compel its performance; and when such duty is threatened to be violated by some posi. tive official act, any person who will sustain personal injury thereby, for which adequate compensation cannot be had at law, may have an injunction to prevent it. In such cases, the writs of mandamus and injunction are somewhat correlative to each other. In either case, if the officer plead the authority of an unconstitutional law for the non-performance or violation of his duty, it will not prevent the issuing of the writ. An unconstitutional law will be treated by the courts as null and void." And the opinion cites Osborne v. Bank of U. S. 9 Wheat. 859, and Davis v. Gray, 16 Wall. 220. The same principle was applied in State Railroad Tax Cases, 92 U. S. 575. In the opinion of the court it is said, (page 615:) "In the examination which we have made of these cases, we do not find any of the matters complained of to come within the rule which we have laid down as justifying the interposition of a court of equity. There is no fraud proved, if alleged. There is no violation of the constitution, either in the statute or in its administration, by the board of equalization. No property is taxed that is not legally liable to taxation; nor is the rule of uniformity prescribed by the constitution violated." If the facts here negatived had been affirmed, the converse of the rule would have been equally applicable.

In Transportation Co. v. Parkersburg, 107 U. S. 691-695, S. C. 2 SUP. CT. REP. 732, it was declared that a bill in equity would lie which seeks to have a wharfage ordinance declared void, and for an injunction to restrain further collections under it, and any further interference with the right of the complainant to the free navigation of the Ohio river, and perhaps, as incidental to the other relief, a demand for the return of the wharfage already paid. The remedy to restrain by injunction taxes levied upon railroads, in alleged violation of a contract with the state, was administered in Tomlinson v. Branch, 15 Wall. 460; and in numerous other similar cases where it has been denied, the jurisdiction to grant the relief, if the facts had warranted it, has been assumed without question. And see Litchfield v. County of Webster, 101 U. S. 773.

In the case of national banks, the assessment and collection of taxes illegally assessed under the authority of state laws, in violation of acts of congress, are habitually restrained by the preventive remedy of injunction, and the jurisdiction of the courts of the United States in those cases is regarded as in the highest degree beneficial and necessary, to prevent the agencies of the government of the United States from being hindered and embarrassed

in the performance of their functions by state legislation. The exercise of that jurisdiction, and by means of that remedy, in such cases is to vindicate the supremacy of the constitution, and to maintain the integrity of the powers and rights which it confers and secures; and that jurisdiction is vested in the courts of the United States, because the cases embraced in it are necessarily cases arising under the constitution and laws of the United States.

Where the rights in jeopardy are those of private citizens, and are of those classes which the constitution of the United States either confers or has taken under its protection, and no adequate remedy for their enforcement is provided by the forms and proceedings purely legal, the same necessity invokes and justifies, in cases to which its remedies can be applied, that *jurisdiction in equity vested by the constitution of the United States, and which cannot be affected by the legislation of the states.

In the present case, the jurisdiction in equity to grant the relief prayed for by injunction, and the propriety of its exercise, are alike indisputable. The decree of the circuit court is accordingly affirmed.

(114 U. S. 317)

CARTER v. GREENHOW.1

(April 20, 1885.)

1. JURISDICTION OF CIRCUIT COURT-DEPRIVATION OF RIGHT, PRIVILEGE, OR IMMUNITY OF CITIZEN UNDER COLOR OF STATE LAW-REV. ST. 22 629, 1979-ACTION AGAINST TAX COLLECTOR-VIRGINIA ACT OF MARCH 30, 1871.

The sixteenth clause of section 629, Rev. St., authorizing suits, without reference to the sum or value in controversy or the citizenship of the parties, to be brought in the circuit courts of the United States to redress the deprivation, under color of state law, of any right, privilege, or immunity secured by the constitution of the United States, in violation of section 1979, Rev. St., does not embrace an action of trespass on the case in which the plaintiff seeks a recovery of damages against a tax collector in Virginia, who, having rejected a tender of tax-receivable coupons, issued under the act of March 30, 1871, seeks to collect the tax for which they were tendered by a seizure and sale of personal property of the plaintiff. 2. SAME-RIGHT OF TAX-PAYER-REMEDY.

Although the right to have such coupons received in payment of taxes is founded on a contract with the state, and that right is protected by the constitution of the United States by article 1, 2 10, forbidding the state to pass any laws impairing the obligation of the contract, the only mode of redress in case of any disturbance or dispossession of property, or for other legal rights based on such violation of the contract, is to have a judicial determination, in a suit between individuals, of the invalidity of the law under color of which the wrong has been committed. No direct action for the denial of the right secured by the contract will lie.

In Error to the Circuit Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Virginia.

Wm. L. Royall, D. H. Chamberlain, Wm. M. Evarts, and Wager Swayne, for plaintiff in error. A. H. Garland, R. T. Merrick, and F. S. Blair, Atty. Gen., for defendant in error.

*MATTHEWS, J. The plaintiff in error brought his action, in the circuit court of the United States, against the defendant, on May 7, 1883. His cause of action is set forth in the declaration as follows: "Samuel S. Carter, plaintiff, complains of Samuel C. Greenhow, defendant, of a plea of trespass on the case, for that the said plaintiff is a citizen of the state of Virginia and a resident of the city of Richmond, in said state. That the plaintiff owns property in said city, and that he was lawfully assessed on said property by the officers of the state of Virginia, whose duty it was under the laws of Virginia to make such assessment, with taxes to be paid to the state of Virginia for the year 1882, and that said taxes were due and leviable for, on, and after the first day of December, 1882. That the defendant, Samuel C. Greenhow, is the treasurer of the city of Richmond, in the state of Virginia, and that the laws of Vir

ginia make it his duty to collect all taxes due to the state of Virginia by res Idents of said city on property situated and being in said city. That on the third day of May, 1883, the plaintiff was indebted to the said state of Virginia on account of the taxes so assessed upon his property as aforesaid for the year 1882, and that on said last-named date he tendered to the defendant, in payment of his said taxes, coupons cut from bonds issued by the state of Virginia, under the provisions of the act of the general assembly of the state of Virginia, approved March 28, 1879, entitled An act to provide a plan of settlement of the public debt,' which coupons, together with a small amount ɔf lawful money of the United States, tendered at the same time, amounted exactly to the sum so due by the plaintiff for taxes as aforesaid, and which coupons were due and past maturity, in payment of his said taxes so due as aforesaid. That by the terms of the act of the general assembly under which said coupons were issued, the said coupons are receivable in payment of all taxes due to the state of Virginia, and that each of said coupons bore upon its face the contract of the state of Virginia that it should be received in payment of taxes lue to said state. That the defendant refused to receive the said coupons and noney in payment of the taxes so due by the plaintiff. That after said sender the said defendant unlawfully entered into and upon the plaintiff's premises and place of business and levied upon and seized the plaintiff's property and carried the same away to sell the same in payment of plaintiff's taxes. That plaintiff was always ready and willing to deliver to the defendant in payment of said taxes, up to the moment when the defendant so levied upon ais said property, the said coupons and money, and he many times offered to do so, but the defendant always refused to receive the same. That the plaintiff has the right under the constitution of the United States to pay his said taxes to the said defendant in the said coupons and money, and that this right is secured to him by the constituton of the United States. That when the defend. ant refused to receive the said coupons and money in payment of the taxes so due as aforesaid by the plaintiff, he did so under color of and by the command of an act of the general assembly of the state of Virginia, approved January 26, 1882, entitled 'An act to provide for the more efficient collection of the revenue, to support government, maintain the public schools, and to pay interest on the public debt,' which act forbids collectors of taxes due to said ntate to receive in payment thereof anything except gold, silver, United States treasury notes, and national bank currency; and that when he so levied upon the plaintiff's property he did so by virtue of and under the command of the eighteenth section of an act of the general assembly of the state of Virginia, approved April 1, 1879, which act is chapter sixty of the laws published by authority of the general assembly of the state of Virginia for the special session, of 1879, and by virtue of and under the command of other statutes enacted by the general assembly of the state of Virginia. That the said two last-mentioned acts of the general assembly of the state of Virginia, and the other mentioned statutes of said state, commanding the defendant to levy so as aforesaid upon the property of the plaintiff, are repugnant to the constitution of the United States, and are therefore void. That in refusing to receive the said coupons and money in payment of said taxes, and in levying on and seizing the plaintiff's property for said taxes, after the plaintiff had tendered the same in payment thereof, the defendant deprived the plaintiff of a right secured to him by the constitution of the United States, under color of statutes enacted by the general assembly of the state of Virginia, to the damage of the plaintiff two hundred dollars, ($200,) and therefore he brings this suit." To this declaration a general demurrer was filed and sustained, and judgment rendered accordingly for the defendant. To reverse that judgment the present writ of error is prosecuted.

The sixteenth clause of section 629, Rev. St., defining the original jurisdiction of the circuit court of the United States, gives to them cognizance, with V.58-59

out reference to the sum or value in controversy, or the citizenship of the parties, "of all suits authorized by law to be brought by any person to redress the deprivation, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage of any state, of any right, privilege, or immunity secured by the constitution of the United States, or of any right secured by any law providing for equal rights of citizens of the United States, or of all persons within the jurisdiction of the United States." Similar jurisdiction is conferred upon district courts by the twelfth clause of section 563, Rev. St. Section 1979, Rev. St., provides that "every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage of any state or territory, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States, or other person within the jurisdiction thereof, to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress." These three provisions constituted the first section of the act of April 20, 1871, entitled "An act to enforce the provisions of the fourteenth amendment to the constitution of the United States, and for other purposes." 17 St. 13. In that section, the language conferring jurisdiction in the courts, was as follows: "Such proceeding to be prosecuted in the several district or circuit courts of the United States, with and subject to the same rights of appeal, review upon error, and other remedies provided in like cases in such courts, under the provisions of the act of the ninth of April, eighteen hundred and sixty-six, entitled 'An act to protect all persons in the United States in their civil rights, and to furnish the means of their vindication,'" and the other remedial laws of the United States which are in their nature applicable in such cases.

The second section of the act here referred to, of April 9, 1866, (14 St. 27,) provided "that any person, who, under color of any law, statute, ordinance, regulation, or custom, shall subject, or cause to be subjected, any inhabitant of any state or territory to the deprivation of any right secured or protected by this act, or to different punishment, pains, or penalties on account of such person having, at any time, been held in a condition of slavery or involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, or by reason of his color or race. than is prescribed for the punishment of white persons, shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and, on conviction, shall be punished by fine not exceeding one thousand dollars, or imprisonment not exceeding one year, or both, in the discretion of the court."

The question presented in this record is whether the facts stated in the plaintiff's declaration constitute a cause of action within the terms of section 1979. Rev. St.; that is, whether he shows himself, within its meaning, to have been subjected by the defendant, under cover of a statute of a state, to the deprivation of a right, privilege, or immunity secured by the constitution. The acts charged against the defendant are that he refused to receive from the plaintiff the coupons tendered in payment of taxes, and thereafter proceeded to levy upon and take his property for the purpose of collecting such taxes in money. *The rights alleged to be violated are the right to pay taxes in coupons instead of in money, and, after a tender of coupons, the immunity from further proceeding to collect such taxes as though they were delinquent. These rights the plaintiff derives from the contract with the state, contained in the act of March 28, 1879, and the bonds and coupons issued under its authority.

How and in what sense are these rights secured to him by the constitution of the United States? The answer is, by that provision, article 1, § 10, which forbids any state to pass laws impairing the obligations of contracts. That constitutional provision, so far as it can be said to confer upon or secure to any person any individual rights, does so only indirectly and incidentally. It