Opinion of the Court. persons who had settled upon them in tracts of not more than 320 acres to each person, in the belief that they were open to location, settlement, preëmption and purchase under the land laws of the United States, and at said time they were occupying said lands in tracts not larger than 320 acres to each, and the said State of Iowa was thereby and therefore prohibited under said constitutional provision from disposing or attempting to dispose of any of the lands in controversy, since none of said persons so occupying said lands consented to any sale or disposition of them whatever." And in the brief of the Attorney General it is stated that "the contest here is not between bona fide settlers as against each other, but this litigation is in the interests of bona fide settlers against speculators who have appropriated these lands in violation of law and of the principles of common honesty." The district judge, deciding this case in the court below, said: "Any purpose to call in question the title of parties in actual possession, holding under the State or the navigation company, is expressly disclaimed in the bill, it being averred that the benefit of a decree in favor of complainant is sought only as to such lands as are now actually occupied by settlers who do not hold title under the State or the navigation company, the same amounting to 109,057 acres." And, after deciding the legal question in favor of the navigation company, he goes on to discuss and suggest what in equity and justice the government should do for the benefit of these settlers. We should be closing our eyes to manifest facts if we did not perceive that the government was only a nominal party, whose aid was sought to destroy the title of the navigation company and its grantees, in order to enable the settlers to perfect their titles, initiated by settlement and occupancy; and in that event, the delay of thirty years is such a delay as a court of equity forbids. At any rate, it makes most apt the observation of Mr. Justice Miller, speaking for the court in the case of United States v. Throckmorton, 98 U. S. 61, 64, in which case a bill had been filed to set aside a decree rendered more than twenty years before: "It is true that the United States is not bound by the statute of limitations, as an indi Opinion of the Court. vidual would be. And we have not recited any of the foregoing matters found in the bill as sufficient of itself to prevent relief in a case otherwise properly cognizable in equity. But we think these are good reasons why a bill which seeks under these circumstances to annul a decree thus surrounded by every presumption which should give it support, shall present on its face a clear and unquestionable ground on which the jurisdiction it invokes can rest." Even if this be regarded as a bill brought by the United States simply to protect its own interests, and recover its own property, still it is well settled that where relief can be granted only by setting aside a grant, a patent or other evidence of title, issued by the government, in the orderly administration of the affairs of the Land Department, the evidence in support must be clear, strong and satisfactory. Muniments of title issued by the government are not to be lightly destroyed. Kansas City, Lawrence &c. Railroad v. Attorney General, 118 U. S. 682; Maxwell Land Grant Case, 121 U. S. 325, 381; Colorado Coal Company v. United States, 123 U. S. 307. In the second of these cases Mr. Justice Miller, speaking for the court, said: "It is not to be admitted that the titles by which so much property in this country and so many rights are held, purporting to emanate from the authoritative action of the officers of the government, and, as in this case, under the seal and signature of the President of the United States himself, shall be dependent upon the hazard of successful resistance to the whims and caprices of every person who chooses to attack them in a court of justice; but it should be well understood that only that class of evidence which commands respect, and that amount of it which produces conviction, shall make such an attempt successful." Returning now to the special contention on the part of the government: It is scarcely necessary to determine whether the trust was one following the lands, or merely in the proceeds of the sales of the lands, and whose faithful performance is a question only between the United States and the State, as was finally determined to be the state of the trust created by the "swamp land" grant. Mills County v. Railroad Companies, Opinion of the Court. 107 U. S. 557. We pass rather to inquire in what manner the State performed the duties or trust imposed by the acceptance of this grant, in so far as such performance affects the title to the lands in controversy. The general purpose of the grant was to aid the Territory or State in improving the navigation of the Des Moines River. The second section of the act prescribed the conditions under which the Territory or State might sell the lands, as follows: "SEC. 2. And be it further enacted, That the lands hereby granted shall not be conveyed or disposed of by said Territory, nor by the State to be formed out of the same, except as said improvements shall progress; that is, the said Territory or State may sell so much of said lands as shall produce the sum of thirty thousand dollars, and then the sales shall cease, until the governor of said Territory or State shall certify the fact to the President of the United States that one-half of said sum has been expended upon said improvement, when the said Territory or State may sell and convey a quantity of the residue of said lands, sufficient to replace the amount expended, and thus the sales shall progress as the proceeds thereof shall be expended, and the fact of such expenditure shall be certified as aforesaid." The third section declared that the price should not be less than the minimum price of other public lands. So that all that the act provided for was, that the State should appropriate the lands to the improvement of the river; that it should make no sales at less than $1.25 per acre; and that its sales should not anticipate its expenditures by more than $30,000. Now, it is not pretended that the State appropriated the lands to any other purpose, or that the price at which it sold was less than $1.25 per acre. The contract between it and the navigation company provided for conveyances only as the work progressed, and money was expended by the company; and the settlement proposed by the legislature and accepted by the company, and the certificate made by the governor to the President, showed that the navigation company had expended money enough to justify the conveyance of all the lands which were in fact conveyed. On the face of the Opinion of the Court. transaction, therefore, the duties imposed by the trust were exactly and properly performed, and the title of the navigation company passed to it in strict compliance with the very letter of the statute. But it is earnestly contended that the navigation company was not a bona fide purchaser; that while it claimed to have expended $330,000 on the improvement, in truth it had not expended half that amount; that by means of its false representations, and by threats of bringing suit against the State and obtaining damages against it, it induced the legislature to pass the resolution of 1858, offering terms of settlement; that the work of improving the river was unfinished, not more than one-tenth of the work necessary therefor having been done; and that the State has wholly abandoned the undertaking. With respect to the last two allegations it is not perceived how, if true, they can affect the title of the navigation company to lands deeded by the State to it in payment of work done. Surely the title to lands which the State conveyed at the inception of the undertaking, either for cash or for work done thereon, cannot fail because the State failed to complete the improvement. No land could have been sold if the purchaser's title had depended upon such a condition. If we examine the testimony, there is nothing in it worthy of mention tending to impeach the bona fides of the transaction between the State and the navigation company. Only one witness was offered by the plaintiff to prove the amount of work done by the navigation company, and the influences by which the action of the legislature was induced, and his testimony carries on its face abundant evidences of its own unworthiness. In the face of the deliberate proceedings of the legislature and the executive officers of the State, in respect to a matter of public interest, open to inspection and of common knowledge, something more than the extravagant and improbable statements of one witness, made thirty years after the event, is necessary to overthrow the settlement. Indeed, counsel for the government make slight reference to this testimony; but rest their case upon the allegations of the bill, which as against the principal defendant, the navigation company, Opinion of the Court. were admitted by demurrer. It is urged that there is an express averment that the navigation company and its grantees are not and never were bona fide purchasers of the lands, or any part thereof. But such a general averment, though repeated once or twice, is to be taken as qualified and limited by the specific facts set forth to show wherein the transaction between the State and the navigation company was fraudulent. Where a bill sets out a series of facts constituting a transaction between two parties, a demurrer admits the truth of those facts and all reasonable inferences to be drawn therefrom, but not the conclusion which the pleader has seen fit to aver. And the fact which stands out conspicuously, is the resolution proposing settlement which passed the legislature of the State of Iowa in March, 1858. That act is beyond challenge. The knowledge and good faith of a legislature are not open to question. It is conclusively presumed that a legislature acts with full knowledge, and in good faith. It is true the bill alleges that its passage was induced by the navigation company, by false representations and threats of suits; but such an allegation amounts to nothing. In Cooley's Constitutional Limitations, (5th ed. 222,) the author, citing several cases, observes: "From what examination has been given to this subject, it appears that whether a statute is constitutional or not is always a question of power; that is, a question whether the legislature in the particular case, in respect to the subject matter of the act, the manner in which its object is to be accomplished and the mode of enacting it, has kept within the constitutional limits and observed the constitutional conditions. In any case in which this question is answered in the affirmative, the courts are not at liberty to inquire into the proper exercise of the power. They must assume that legislative discretion has been properly exercised. If evidence was required, it must be supposed that it was before the legislature when the act was passed; and if any special finding was required to warrant the passage of the special act, it would seem that the passage of the act itself might be held to be equivalent to such finding. And, although it has sometimes been urged at the bar that the courts ought to inquire into the |