BOARDMAN V.THOmSON.
615
v.
THOMPSON.
caircuit:(J¢.t'l't, lJ.Kentuck1l. July; Itl, 1882.) . POSTMASTER-REFUSAL TO DELIVER MAIL MATTER-REMEDY. ,
Where the postmaster refuses to deliver registered letters and letters containing money orders, and other matter addressed through on which postage has been prepaid, the rem,edy of the aggrieved party is by mandamul or replevin, and not by injunction,.
In E q u i t y . . . David W. Sanders and1ames A. Beattie,f9rCOQlplainant. A. A. Freeman, Asst. U. S. Atty. Gen., for defendant. MATTHEWS, Justice. The question pre"sented in this case, stated in its simplest .form, as it is claimed to arise' upon the pleadings, is whether this court will, by its writ of injunction, prohibit a postmaster of the United States from refusing to deliver registered letters, and letters containing money orders, and other matter addressed through themail.onwhichhasbeenprepaidtheproperpostage.to the party to whom they are directed. In my opinion there is no such jurisdiction; If the alleged right ensts to require by judicial process the performance of such a duty on the part of a. public officer towards a private individual, then it is a legal right, the specific enforcement of which is the proper function of a mandamus, or replevin fOr the recovery of the possession of the articles, or an action for damages against the officer. There is no sufficient ground for the interference of equity. If, on the other hand, a postmaster is respofisible only-to his political superior, and amenable to the law only for such breaches of duty as it has defined, and by the means it has provided, as by indictment and punishment and removal from office, then the present grievance is as much withdrawn from the jurisdiction of a court of equity as from the ordinary course of the common law. It is quite certain that a perpetual injunction in the terms prayed for could not lawfully be granted, for the postmaster might be lawfully required by the postmaster general to withhold from delivery correspondence with a named party, believed by him to be engaged in a forbidden business; and an injunction for each instance in which it might be shown that no such prohibition existed, would be but an equitable replevin, without the justification of preventing a multiplicity of actions. For these reasons the bill should be dismissed, and it is so ordered. BARR, D. J., concurs in the foregoing opinion.
676 HENDERSON 11.
JAQKSON CO\TNTY.
(Oircuit Oou'l't, W. D. Missouri,.E. D. November. 1881.) Towl'is-Am TO RAILROADS-ATTACHING TERRITORY.
, Under the provision of the' constitution, that the legislature cannot authorize a municipal corporation to tax for its Own local purposes lands lying beyond the corporate limits, the legislature has power to attach outside territory to the territory of a town and erect the territory so attached, together with the territory of the town, into a district, and authorize the district so formed to vote a rai,lroad, and issue bonds in payment thereBubscription to the stock of a . of, and an act to this effect is constitutional.'
J(jseph Shippen, for plaintiff. Comingo <t Broadhead, for defendant.
KREKEL, D. J. This suit is bl,'ought upon coupons detached from bonds issued by the county of Jackson to the Kansas City & Westport HOJ:se Railroad Company, or bearer. The bonds are in the usual form, and recite that. they are issued "pursuant to an order of the county court of Jackson county, made at the June term, 1871, of said court, and authorized by a vote of the people of the district hereinbefore described, by virtue of an act of· the general. assembly of the of Missouri,eptitled'An act attaching certain territory to the tOWIl' of Westport to said town to take stock in a railroad,' {l.pproved March 18, 1871.." The agreed statement. of facts filed in the case shows that on the seventeenth day of April, 1871,the county court of Jackson'county, on petition of 47 citizens and tax-payers of the district, es.ta;blished by the act of the eighteenth of. March, 1871, made an ordel,';for an election submitting to the voters 'of the district a proposition to subscribe $25,000 to the capital stock in the Kansas City & Westport Horse Railroad Company in bonds ; that an election was held on the sixteenth of May, 1871, and tha.t two-thirds of the qualified voters voted in favor of the proposition; that the amount of stock voted was subscribed; that no stock certificate was issued, but that such issue on demand was refused by the horse railroad company; that Jackson county never voted the stock; that the stock was sold aIld assigned by Jackson county for $12,000, which was applied in payment of part of the $25,000 of bonds issued first falling due; that the county court levied and. collected taxes for a number of years in the district to pay the interest coupons, and that the same were paid for the years 1872,1873, and 1874; that no levy of taxes has taken place since; that the bonds were issued under the acts of. March 23, 1868,