governor, lieutenant-governor, senators, or representatives, and who shall have paid, by himself, or his parents, master, or guardian, any State or county tax, which shall, within two years next preceding such election, have been assessed upon him, in any town or district of the Commonwealth; and also every citizen who shall be by law exempted from taxation, and who shall be in any other respects qualified as above mentioned, shall have a right to vote in such election of governor, lieutenant governor, senator, and representatives; and no other person shall be entitled to vote in such election." Article 3, Amend. A reading and writing qualification was established in 1857, by article 20, Amend Const. But this it will not be necessary to consider in the present discussion.

The qualifications of voters are thus defined with clearness and precision. Without the possession of these, the citizen or inhabitant cannot exercise the privilege of voting; and as whoever possesses them is by the Constitution entitled to their privilege, legislation cannot deprive him of it. By the Constitution, pt. 3, chap. 1, art. 4, full authority and power is given to the general court, "from time to time, to make, ordain and establish all manner of wholesome and reasonable orders, laws, statutes, and ordinances, directions, and instructions, either with penalties or without, so as the same be not repugnant or contrary to this Constitution, as they shall judge to be for the good and welfare of this Commonwealth, and for the government and ordering thereof, and of the subjects of the same, and for the necessary support and defense of the government thereof." To the provisions of the Constitution all legislation is thus made subordinate, and it cannot add to nor diminish the qualifications of a voter which that instrument has prescribed. Blanchard v. Stearns, 5 Metc. 298; Williams v. Whiting, 11 id. 433.

"This provision of the Constitution," says Opinion of Justices, 5 Metc. 592, referring to article 3 of the amendment above quoted, "being irrepealable by any act or ordinary legislation, must be obeyed and carried into effect according to its plain intent and meaning, so far as that can be ascertained." The plaintiff, according to the allegations of his declarations, possessed, when he offered himself for registration, all the qualifications of a voter required by the Constitution.

Any legislation by which the exercise of his rights is postponed, diminishes them, and must be unconstitutional, unless it can be defended on the ground that it is reasonable and necessary, in order that the rights of the proposed voter may be ascertained and proved, and thus the rights of others (which are to be protected as well as his own) guarded against the danger of illegal voting. The Constitution, while providing for the qualifications of voters, contemplates that equal and reasonable rules will be made by legislation as to the method of exercising the privilege, and also that somewhere, and at some time, under proper regulations, there will be an inquiry whether those offering to vote possess the requisite qualifications. This inquiry involves an investigation of various facts; as those in regard to the proposed voter's age, sex, residence, payment of taxes, etc. It is not an unreasonable provision that all persons entitled as voters shall be registered as such previous to depositing their ballots; and if the Legislature deems that such an inquiry could not proceed concurrently with the actual voting or election, and both be conducted in a deliberate and orderly manner, it is not unreasonable that it should provide that such an inquiry should terminate before the election actually commences, at a time previous sufficiently long to make proper preparations

therefor.

The plaintiff in the case at bar does not contend that

the Legislature has not the right to make any reasonable, uniform, and impartial regulation of the mode of exercising the right of suffrage, and also of ascertaining the qualifications of voters. He denies that the seventh section of the statute under discussion is of this character. The leading case, not only in this Commonwealth, but in the whole discussion that has taken place in this country in regard to the right of legislatures to provide for judging the qualifications of voters, and for regulating the exercise of their privileges by them as these are prescribed by the Constitutions of the States respectively, is Capen v. Foster, 12 Pick. 485. It was there held that the acts of 1821, chap. 110, and 1822, chap. 104, providing for a registration of voters in Boston, and requiring that previous to an election, the qualifications of voters should be proved, and their names be placed on an alphabetical list or register, was not to be regarded as prescribing a qualification in addition to those which by the Constitution entitled a citizen to vote, but only as a reasonable regulation of the mode of exercising the right of voting, which it was competent for the Legislature to make. But while it is held to be within the proper limits of legislative power to provide suitable regulations for exercising the right of suffrage in a prompt, orderly and convenient manner, the court, speaking through Chief Justice Shaw, is careful to add: "Such a construction would afford no warrant for such an exercise of legislative power, as under the pretense and color of regulating should subvert or injuriously restrain the right itself. * It (the Constitution) fixed the qualifications of voters with precision, and left all the rest to be regulated by law.

**

* *

* The Constitution, by carefully prescribing the qualifications of voters, necessarily requires that an examination of the claims of persons to vote, or the ground of possessing these qualifications, must at some time be had by those who are to decide upon them.

*

** If then the Constitution has made no provision in regard to the time, place and manner in which such examination shall be had, and yet such an examination is necessarily incident to the actual enjoyment and exercise of the right of voting, it constitutes one of those subjects respecting the mode of exercising the right in relation to which it is competent to the Legislature to make suitable and reasonable regulations, not calculated to defeat or impair the right of voting, but rather to facilitate and secure the exercise of that right."

If the seventh section of the statute of 1885 were general in terms, and allowed no person to register as a voter until he had possessed the requisite qualifications for a period of thirty days, it would be difficult to maintain its constitutionalty. It would still provide for adding another qualification to those required by the Constitution, as much as if the period of domicile within the town or the Commonwealth, required by the Constitution before voting, were extended to a longer period. State v. Williams, 5 Wis. 308; Quinn v. State, 35 Ind. 485. The Constitution does not provide that the qualifications it requires shall be possessed by the voter for any period before the election, nor has it ever been held that this was necessary. To add this requirement before one can be registered as a voter is certainly to increase the qualifications. Bridge v. Lincoln, 14 Mass. 367; Humphrey v. Kingman, 5 Metc. 162-165; Kilham v. Ward, 2 Mass. 236.

In an opinion of the justices (124 Mass. 597), in reply to an inquiry by the House of Representatives as to whether one who had been, but had ceased to be a pauper, must have ceased to be such for any definite period before he could exercise the right of suffrage, it was said: "It is no more required that the voter

shall have ceased to be a pauper, or under guardianship, a year or six months before the election, than that he shall have been a citizen or of age during a like period. It has never been doubted that minors, having the other requisite qualifications, become qualified to vote immediately upon arriving at full age; and by uniform usage, recognized and approved in an opinion given to the honorable house last year, persons otherwise qualified, who have been naturalized at any time before the election, have been deemed entitled to vote. The necessary conclusion appears to us to be that by the third article of amendment of the Constitution of the Commonwealth, the disqualification of pauperism or guardianship, like that of alienage or nonage, is not required to have ceased to exist for any definite period of time in order to entitle a man actually free from every such disqualification, and duly qualified in point of residence and of payment of taxes, to exercise the right of suffrage."

Nor if such a law were general, is it easy to see how it could be defended upon the ground that is was a reasonable regulation for the purpose simply of ascertaining qualifications, and determining whether an applicant actually possessed them. Every system of registration of voters contemplates that the registration will be completed, and that the list of voters will be prepared before voting actually commences. No system would be just that did not extend the time of registration up to a time as near that of actually depositing the votes as would be consistent with the necessary preparation for conducting the election in an orderly manner, and with a reasonable scrutiny of the correctness of the list. While cases may be conceived where the right to vote might depend on a somewhat complicated inquiry, ordinarily the facts on which it depends are simple, and susceptible of rapid investigation. Because a difficult inquiry is possible, to provide that all citizens proving themselves to possess the requisite qualifications as voters should not be allowed to register as such for thirty days thereafter, and thus be obliged to show in addition that they had possessed them for that lenght of time, might be held an unreasonable regulation in regard to the exercise of the privilege of suffrage. In many instances the right to vote might itself accrue, as by expiration of time, by payment of taxes, etc., within thirty days which precedes the registration.

But serious as these objections would be to the constitutionality of a general law applicable to all classes of citizens, it is not necessary now to consider them, as the section of the statute in question presents an even more serious difficulty. It undertakes to prevent a single class of citizens, namely, those who are naturalized, possessing all the qualifications established by the Constitution of the Commonwealth, from exercising the right with which that Constitution invests them, for a period of thirty days, by forbidding the registrars of voters to register them during that period. All citizens must stand equal before the law, and the statute, assuming them to be citizens, imposes this prohibition upon them as a citizens of a specified class. A statute regulating the exercise of the right of suffrage, or the ascertainment of the qualifications of voters, must not only be reasonable in its character, but uniform and impartial in its application. If it were possible to impose a period of probation upon all qualified citizens before they were entitled to exercise the privilege, it certainly is not possible, under the Constitution, to select a single class, and impose it on them alone.

"A registry act," says Mr. McCrary in his work on Elections, § 8, "which should undertake to require a longer residence, prior to the time of voting, than that required by the Constitution, or which should require the payment of taxes not required to be paid by

constitutional provision, or which should impose upon a particular class of citizens conditions and requirements not required of all others, would be void."

It was suggested at the argument that the section of the statute here in question might be upheld as a reasonable regulation to protect the public from possible fraud in obtaining certificates of naturalization, and that the delay of thirty days before naturalized citizens are permitted to register allows this investigation. But the board of registrars is not competent to pass upon the question whether a certificate of naturalization was erroneously granted, nor can such a certificate be attacked before them thus collaterally. The only question upon this part of their inquiry into the qualifications of the applicant is whether he is in fact the person named in the certificate he produces, if such certificate be itself properly authenticated. It is a question of identity solely.

No argument in favor of the constitutionality of the section can be founded upon any peculiarity in the situation of naturalized citizens, which renders an inquiry in regard to their qualifications different from similar inquiries when applied to all other citizens. The regulation which it assumes to make is partial, and calculated injuriously to restrain and impede, in the exercise of their rights, the class to whom it applies, in that it denies them for the period of thirty days the exercise of a right which the Constitution has conferred upon them. There is no warrant for this within the just and constitutional limits of the legislative power, which permits reasonable and uniform regulations to be made as to the time and mode of exercising the right of suffrage, and as to the ascertainment of the qualification of voters.

We must therefore pronounce the seventh section of chapter 345, acts 1885, to be unconstitutional. It follows that this action can be maintained. Kilham v. Ward, ubi supra; Lincoln v. Hapgood, 11 Mass. 350353; Blanchard v. Stearns, ubi supra; Larned v. Wheeler, 140 Mass. 390; S. C., 50 Am. Rep. 483.

The case will stand for trial, and the entry will be, demurrer overruled.

[See Daggett v. Hudson, 43 Ohio St. 548; S. C., 54 Am. Rep. 832, and note, 483; People v. Hoffman, 116 Ill. 587; S. C., 56 Am. Rep. 793; Dells v. Kennedy, 49 Wis. 555; S. C., 35 Am. Rep. 786.—ED.]

NEW YORK COURT OF APPEALS ABSTRACT.

EJECTMENT-PARTIES-INFANT REMAINDER-MEN.A wife acquired title to a lot by deed, subject to a reservation to the grantor of certain described lands. At her death the lot went to her infant children as remainder-men subject to the life-estate of her husband. An action of ejectment was brought against the husband and infants for the premises included in the reservation. The wife had never claimed these premises nor was there any evidence that the infants had ever asserted title to them, or were in possession of them, while in their answer they expressly denied having any interest in the lands demanded. Held, that they were not bound by any acts of their father, and that their joinder as infant defendants was not authorized by section 1503, Code N. Y., which provides that any person claiming title to, or the right to the possession of, real property sought to be recovered in an action, as remainder-men, etc., adversely to the plaintiff may be joined as defendant. June 7, 1887. Sisson v. Cummings. Opinion by Andrews, J.

EVIDENCE-WITNESS-CROSS-EXAMINATION-HARM

LESS ERROR. It is always competent to bring out, on cross-examination, what relations exist between a party and his witness, for the purpose of showing bias

or prejudice on the part of the witness, and it is error to refuse to allow a question, looking to that end, to be put; but where the evidence in chief is wholly immaterial upon all the material issues of the case, such refusal is harmless error. June 7, 1887. Teets v. Village of Middletown. Per Curiam.

MUNICIPAL BONDS - TAXATION SINKING FUND — DUTY OF COUNTY TREASURER-PETITION-CONSTITU

TIONAL LAW.-- -(1) Laws N. Y. 1869, chap. 807, § 4, as amended by Laws 1871, chap. 383, providing that all taxes, except for schools and roads, assessed upon and paid by any railroad in a town which has issued bonds in aid of such railroad, shall be applied by the county treasurer to the purchase of certain bonds to be held by him as a sinking fund for the redemption of such aid bonds, applies not only in the case of railroads constructed under the act of 1869, but to all towns bonded in aid of railroads constructed in or through them. (2) It is the duty of the county treasury, under the act, to set aside and invest all such taxes paid to him, although by doing so a deficiency is left in other funds, and he will not have money enough to pay the obligations of the county to the State, and to the county officials and county creditors. (3) Ample power is conferred upon the county judge, by the act, to ascertain the correct amount of the tax to be set aside for the sinking fund; and it is no valid objection to a petition of a tax-payer to compel the treasurer to make the investment as provided by the act that it states the amount to be less than it really is. (4) The act of 1869 is not in conflict with Const. N. Y., art. 7, § 8. providing that "no moneys shall ever be paid out of the treasury of the State or any of the funds under its management, except in pursuance of an appropriation by law," etc. The money in the hands of the county treasurer cannot be regarded as in the treasury of the State, nor as belonging to the State, or to any fund under its management. (5) Nor does the act of 1869 violate Const. N. Y., art. 3, 320, which provides that "every law which imposes * * * a tax shall distinctly state the tax, and the object to which it is to be applied, and it shall not be sufficient to refer to any other law to fix such tax or object. The act in question simply specifies what may be done with a tax which has been legally imposed. (6) Still less is the act unconstitutional as imposing on the other towns of the county a tax for the benefit of the town through which the railroad in question runs. As to such other towns, it is practically the same as if the railroad property was exempt from taxation. June 7, 1887. In re Petition of Clark. Opinion by Earl, J.

PRIORITY

GOOD

VENDOR'S LIEN - MORTGAGE FAITH — BURDEN OF PROOF. As between an assignee of a mortgage, taken by the original mortgagee with notice of an outstanding vendor's lien, and the unpaid vendor in possession at the date of the assignment, seeking to enforce his lien, and charging fraud on the part of the vendee in putting the deed on record, the burden of alleging and proving innocence and good faith is upon the assignee, and in the absence of such pleading and proof his mortgage will be postponed to the lien. June 7, 1887. Seymour v. McKinstry. Opinion by Danforth, J.

UNITED STATES SUPREME COURT ABSTRACT.

INSURANCE-ACCIDENT-PROOFS-WAIVER-AGENCY.

-An agent of an accident insurance company who had served in that capacity for ten years, and who had written the risk, when told by a friend of the assured of his death, undertook to notify the company

at its principal office. He did so, and was supplied by the secretary with blanks for "proofs," which he gave to the representatives of the assured, with instructions to return them to him when filled out. This was done. He kept them several months, and then sent them back for correction. When they came into his hands again he held them back several weeks before sending them to the home office, which retained them without objection that they came too late. Held, that the company had treated the agent as having authority to receive proofs, although the policy required notice to the home office, and that it was not in a position to exact a forfeiture for failure to give "immediate notice." May 27, 1887. Travellers' Ins. Co. of Hartford, Conn. v. Edwards. Opinion by Miller, J:

REMOVAL OF CAUSE-RAILROAD-INCORPORATIONDIFFERENT STATES.-The act of Tennessee of December 4, 1851, entitled "An act to incorporate the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company," granted to that company, which had been incorporated by the Legislature of Kentucky by the act of that State of March 5, 1850, a right of way within designated limits, for the construction of a railroad, with all the rights, etc., and subject to all the restrictions, etc., prescribed in its charter, and fixed the terms and conditions upon which it was to exercise the franchise given it. Held. that the act did not make the company a corporation of Tennessee. Ohio & M. R. Co. v. Wheeler, 1 Black. 286, 293, 397; Railroad Co. v. Harris, 12 Wall. 65, 83; Railroad Co. v. Vance, 96 U. S. 450; Memphis & C. R. Co. v. Alabama, 107 id. 581, 584. In the recent case of Pennsylvania Co. v. St. Louis, A. & T. H. R. Co., 118 U. S. 295, 296, the general question now before us received careful consideration. It was there said: "It does not seem to admit of question that a corporation of one State, owning property and doing business in another State, by permission of the latter, does not thereby become a citizen of this State also. And so a corporation of Illinois, authorized by its laws to build a railroad across the State from the Mississippi river to its eastern boundary, may by permission of the State of Indiana, extend its road a few miles within the limits of the latter, or indeed through the entire State, and may use and operate the line as one road by the permission of the State, without thereby becoming a corporation or a citizen of the State of Indiana. Nor does it seem to us that an act of the Legislature conferring upon this corporation of Illinois, by its Illinois corporate name, such powers to enable it to use and control that part of the road within the State of Indiana, as have been conferred on it by the State which created it, constitutes it a corporation of Indiana. It may not be easy in all such cases to distinguish between the purpose to create a new corporation, which shall owe its existence to the law or statute under consideration, and the intent to enable the corporation already in existence, under the laws of another State, to exercise its functions in the State where it is so received. To make such a company a corporation of another State, the language used must imply creation, or adoption in such form as to confer the power usually exercised over corporations by the State, or by the Legislature, and such allegiance as a State corporation owes to its creator. The mere grant of privileges or powers to it as an existing corporation without more does not do this, and does not make it a citizen of the State conferring such powers." So that the essential inquiry here must be, whether within the doctrine established in the cases we have cited, the State of Tennessee, by her legislation, granted a mere license to the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company to exercise within her limits all or some of the powers conferred upon it by the State of

Kentucky, or established a new corporation over which she could exert such direct control and authority as is usually exerted by a State over corporations of her own creation. The solution of this question depends upon the intent of the Legislature of Tennessee, as gathered from the words used in the statutes now to be examined. Looking at the body of the Tennessee act of December 4, 1851, we find no language clearly evincing a purpose to create a new corporation or to adopt one of another State, in such form as to establish the same relations in law between the latter corporation and the State of Tennessee, as would exist in the case of one created by that State. Taking the whole of that act together, we are satisfied that it was not within the mind of the Legislature of Tennessee to create a new corporation, but only to give the assent of that State to the exercise by the defendant, within her limits, and subject to certain conditions, of some of the powers granted to it by the State creating it. Upon the authority of the cases cited, and for the reasons herein stated, we are of opinion that the Louisville & Nashville Railroad Company is a corporation of Kentucky, and not of Tennessee, and consequently that the action was removable, upon its petition and bond, into the Circuit Court of the United States. May 27, 1887. Goodlett v. Louisville & N. R. Co. Opinion by Harlan, J.

STATUTE OF LIMITATIONS- ACKNOWLEDGMENT NEW PROMISE.-S., being indebted to T. on a promissory note secured by a deed of trust, executed an instrument to the following effect, after the note was barred by the statute of limitations: The writing began with a reference, by way of consideration only, to the original debt, designating it as "the indebtedness described in the deed of trust." A pledge then followed of a certain claim of S. against the national government and its proceeds, to secure the payment of "said indebtedness, with interest thereon," etc.; the interest being mentioned, not as a part of the consideration, or of the original debt, or as any thing for which S. was liable, but only as something to the payment of which the claim pledged should be applied. The writing concluded with a promise of S. that the proceeds of the claim pledged should “be applied to the payment of said indebtedness, with interest as aforesaid," etc. Held, that the instrument was not an express promise of S. to pay the note, nor an express acknowledgment of the note from which a promise to pay it might be inferred. King v. Riddle, 7 Cranch, 168; Clementson v. Williams, 8 id. 72; Bell v. Morrison, 1 Pet. 351; Moore v. Bank of Columbia, 6 id. 86; Randon v. Toby, 11 How. 493; Walsh v. Mayer, 111 U. S. 31; Fort Scott v. Hickman, 112 id. 150.

In full accord with these views are the decisions in England under the statute of 9 Geo. IV, ch. 14, known as "Lord Tenterden's Act," which only restricts the mode of proof by requiring that in order to continue or revive the debt, an "acknowledgment or promise shall be made by or contained in some writing to be signed by the party chargeable thereby," The English judges have repeatedly approved the statement of Mr. (afterward Chief Justice) Jervis, that the writing must either contain an express promise to pay the debt, or be "in terms from which an unqualified promise to pay it is necessary to be implied." Everett v. Robertson, 1 El. & El. 16, 19; Mitchell's Claim, L. R., 6 Ch. 822, 828; Morgan v. Rowlands, L. R., 7 Q. B. 493, 497; citing Jervis New Rules (4th ed.), 350, note. And it has been often held that when the debtor, in the same writing by which he acknowledged the debt, without expressly promising to pay it, agrees that certain property shall be applied to its payment, there can be no implication of a personal promise to pay. Routledge v. Ramsay, 8 Adol. & E.

Sec

221; S. C., 3 Nev. & P. 319; Howcutt v. Bonser, 3 Exch. 491; Cawley v. Furnell, 12 C. B. 291; Everett v. Robertson, above cited. The law upon this subject has been well summed up by Vice-Chancellor Wigram, as follows: "The legal effect of an acknowledgment of a debt barred by a statute of limitations is that of a promise to pay the old debt, and for this purpose the old debt is a consideration in law. In that sense, and for that purpose the old debt may be said to be revived. It is revived as a consideration for a new promise. But the new promise, and not the old debt, is the measure of the creditor's right. If a debtor simply acknowledges an old debt, the law implies from that simple acknowledgment a promise to pay it; for which promise the old debt is a sufficient consideration. But if the debtor promises to pay the old debt when he is able, or by installments, or in two years, or out of a particular fund, the creditor can claim nothing more than the promise gives him." Phillips v. Phillips, 3 Hare, 281, 299, 300; Buckmaster v. Russell, 10 C. B. (N. S.) 745, 750. In the most recent English case that has come under our notice Lord Justice Bowen said: "Now, first of all, the acknowledgment must be clear in order to raise the implication of a promise to pay. An acknowledgment which is not clear will not raise that inference. ondly, supposing there is an acknowledgment of a debt, which would, if it stood by itself, be clear enough still, if words are found combined with it which prevent the possibility of the implication of the promise to pay arising, then the acknowledgment is not clear within the meaning of the definition; "because the words express the lesser in such a way as to exclude the greater." Green v. Humphreys, 26 Ch. Div. 474, 479, 480; S. C., 53 L. J. Ch. (N. S.) 625, 628. In the light of the principles established by the authorities above referred to, it is quite clear that the instrument signed by the defendant on June 21, 1877, did not take the plaintiff's debt out of the statute. Although the old debt is expressly called, as it is in law, the consideration for the new agreement, this agreement, and not the old debt, is the measure of the plaintiff's right. The provisions for the payment of the debt and interest out of a particular fund exclude any implication of a personal promise to pay either. The whole instrument clearly evinces the defendant's intention in executing it to have been that the property pledged should be applied, so far as it would go, to the payment of the debt and interest, and not that his own personal liability should be increased or prolonged in any respect. To imply from the terms of this instrument a promise of the defendant to pay the debt himself would be, in our opinion, to construe it against its manifest intent, and to fritter away the statute of limitations. May 27, 1887. Shepherd v. Thompson. Opinion by Gray, J.

"

-

TAXATION CONSTITUTIONAL LAW DISCRIMINATION-NATIONAL BANK STOCK-LEGISLATIVE POWER

REMEDIAL STATUTE (1) A county assessor assessed the stock of all the banks in the county, both State and national, at the par value. The actual value of the shares of the National Albany Exchange Bank was from twenty-five to thirty per cent above par. The actual value of the shares of all the banks in the county, with one exception, was above par, varying in that respect from ten to over one hundred per cent. In a suit by a shareholder of the national bank referred to, to cover the amount paid upon his stock on the ground of discrimination, held, that the discrimination not being designed by the assessor, the assessment-considering the nature of the property, the fluctuations in value to which it was subject, and the fact that the method was applied to all banks, State and national-came as

nearly as practicable to securing between them equality and uniformity of taxation, and was valid: following Stanley v. Supervisors Albany Co., infra. (2) Where by statute the assessors are required to complete the assessment roll by a certain date, and to make oath to it in a prescribed form, and it is essential that these requirements should be observed to enable notices to be published specifying a time when they would meet for the purpose of reviewing the assessments on the application of any person aggrieved, defects arising through the non-completion of the assessment roll by the specified date, and departure from the prescribed form of oath, may be cured by remedial statute subsequently enacted, providing the right of the tax payers aggrieved by the assessment to have their objections passed upon be saved. The irregularities in the assessment for the years 1876, 1877 and 1878, in that no entry of any assessment of the shares of the plaintiff, and of the stockholders whose claims were assigned to him, was made on the assessment roll of those years, until after the 1st of September, and after that time for revising and correcting the assessment had passed, and in the defect of the oath annexed, in its averment as to the estimate of the value of real estate, were, in our judgment cured by the validating act of April 30, 1883. The power of taxation vested in the Legislature is, with some exceptions, limited only by constitutional provisions designed to secure equality and uniformity in the assessment. The mode in which the property shall be appraised, by whom its appraisement shall be made, the time within which it shall be done, what certificate of their action shall be furnished, and when parties shall be heard for the correction of errors, are matters resting in its discretion. Where directions upon the subject might originally have been dispensed with, or executed at another time, irregularities arising from neglect to follow them may be remedied by the Legislature, unless its action in this respect is restrained by constitutional provisions prohibiting retrospective legislation. Is is only necessary therefore in any case to consider whether the assessment could have been ordered originally without requiring the proceedings, the omission or defective performance of which is complained of, or without quiring them within the time designated. If they were not essential to any valid assessment, and therefore might have been omitted or performed at another time, their omission or defective performance may be cured by the same authority which directed them, provided al ways that intervening rights are not impaired. Such is the conclusion of numerous adjudications by the State courts upon the effect of curative acts, and of this court in Mattingly v. District of Columbia, 97 U. S. 687, 690. Hart v. Henderson, 17 Mich. 218; Musselman v. Logansport, 29 Ind. 533; Grim v. Weissenberg School Dist., 57 Penn. St. 433. The completion of the assessment roll in the case at bar before the 1st of September in the years mentioned, and the form of oath annexed, were not so vital to the assessment itself as necessarily to render the defect arising from a later return or a deficient oath incurable. The completion of the assessment roll by that date was deemed essential by the court below, because the law required the assessors forthwith to cause notices to be published in three of the public newspapers of the city for twenty days, specifying a day at their expiration when they would meet and remain in session five days for the purpose of reviewing their assessments on the application of any one aggrieved. The requirement was designed to afford tax payers whose names were on the roll an opportunity for the examination and correction of the assessment of their property. The assessment could

not stand if they were deprived of that opportunity. But it is not perceived why it might not be legalized and confirmed by the Legislature giving to them such opportunity after the time originally designated had expired. No just right of the tax payer would thereby be defeated. The assessment of the shares of the bank for the years 1876, 1877 and 1878 was held invalid for the reason stated, under the laws of the State, although from what we have said it would not be open to objection as being in conflict with the act of Congress. It is only in view of its invalidity for want of conformity to the laws of the State that the validating act becomes of importance. That act declares that the assessments contained in the assessment rolls of the wards of the city for the above years are "in all things legalized and confirmed, subject to the rights of the shareholders, or their personal representatives, in national or State banks which were located in said city, during those years, and the assessments against whom, by reason of their ownership of such shares, were collected by process of law, to claim a deduction from or cancellation of such assessments." It required the assessors, within ten days after the passage of the act, to publish in the official papers of the city daily for three weeks, Sundays and holidays excepted, a notice to the stockholders that the assessors would be in attendance in their office in Albany for three weeks subsequent to the last day of publication of the notice, and hear applications for the deduction from the assessments of any amount which such stockholders or their personal representatives would have been entitled to deduct under the law as it existed in the year when the assessment was placed on the roll, had such application then been made. And the act provided that such shareholders, or any one representing them, might appear before the assessors and apply for a deduction or cancellation of the assessment upon any ground which would have been a legal one when the assessment was placed on the roll, and the assessors were empowered to grant such reduction or cancellation as the shareholders would have been legally entitled to at that time. The act also made provision for the collection and payment to the parties of the amount found to be due them, with interest. It is difficult to see on what plausible ground the validity of this act can be questioned, unless the power of the Legislature to cure by legislative act any irregularities of the assessment be denied. Every right of the shareholder who had paid taxes on the assessment-and it does not appear that there were any others-was secured. He could present any claim he might have for a reduction or cancellation of the assessment, and be heard respecting it. He occupied the same position he would have held if the assessment of his shares had been placed on the assessment roll within the time required —that is, before the 1st of September-and the oath annexed had been without any fault or omission in its averments. The plaintiff and the other shareholders were bound, as owners of property, to bear their just proportion of the public burdens, and if in ascertaining what that proportion should be, some steps in the proceeding were omitted which invalidated the assessment, it would seem but just that the defect should be cured, if practicable, and the shareholders not be allowed to escape taxation, and thus entail the burden they should bear upon other tax payers of the community. May 23, 1887. Williams v. Board of Supervisors of Albany. Opinion by Field, J.