Statement of Facts.

carriers for hire; that the principal part of the business of the company in New Jersey was to be transacted in Jersey City; and that the business out of that State was to be done in the cities of New York and Brooklyn and the several villages, landing places, cities and towns on the Hudson River, Staten Island, and Long Island, in New York, accessible by water. The defendants Starin, Independent Steamboat Company, Starin's City, River and Harbor Transportation Company, and New York and Staten Island Steamboat Company each filed a separate answer to the complaint. All the other defendants, who were the masters or pilots or engineers employed in running the several boats, united in one answer. The answers all contained substantially the same defences. They admitted the ownership of the boats as set forth in the complaint, except that it was alleged the Castleton belonged to the New York and Staten Island Steamboat Company instead of Starin. They admitted the charter of the city, with words purporting to grant certain rights as to the establishment of ferries from Manhattan Island to the opposite shores, but denied that this grant extended to ferries between New York and that part of Staten Island which borders upon the Kill von Kull. They admitted that the several boats mentioned in the complaint were run at stated times by the Independent Steamboat Company, under the management of the masters and engineers, without the license or permission of the city, for the transportation of persons and property between Pier 18, North River, which is on Manhattan Island, and certain landing places on the shore of Staten Island, making daily fourteen trips, or thereabouts, but they denied that, in so doing, the company either operated a ferry or usurped any franchise belonging to the city. They also denied the allegations in the complaint as to the connection of the defendant Starin with the Independent Steamboat Company, and denied that Starin was the person who was actually operating the boats.

The answers then alleged, "as a matter of special defence under the laws of the United States".

1. That the Independent Steamboat Company was a corporation, organized and incorporated under the laws of New

Statement of Facts.

Jersey, for the purpose of transporting persons and property by water, as a common carrier for hire, in and over the waters of the Hudson River, Kill von Kull, Raritan Bay, and their tributaries, between places on such waters in New York and New Jersey, including Staten Island and Long Island, and the cities of New York and Brooklyn; that the company chartered the boats in question from the several owners thereof, and leased wharves and landing places in New York and on the shore of Staten Island bordering on the Kill von Kull, for the purpose of engaging in the business of transportation by water between such wharves and landings.

2. That all the boats in question were enrolled and licensed, under the laws of the United States for carrying on the coasting trade, as vessels of the United States, and that the individual defendants described as masters or engineers on the boats are all licensed under the laws of the United States to act as masters or pilots, or as engineers, on steam vessels upon the waters traversed by the boats in question.

3. That for a number of years terminating in 1874 steamboats, similar to those operated by the company, and doing a transportation business similar to that in which the company is engaged, had been, without any license or permission from the city, navigated from Pier 18, New York, to the landing places on Staten Island made use of by the company, and back; that large sums were realized therefrom, and that since 1874 this business has greatly increased.

4. That the waters of the Hudson River or bay of New York, and the Kill von Kull, are waters of the United States, and public and common highways of interstate and international commerce; that the steamboats as operated by the company do not constitute a ferry within the meaning of the laws of the United States, or of the State of New York, or of the city charter, but that the city seeks, under the cover of its charter and by this suit, to establish in itself, as and for a monopoly and as private property, the ownership of all rights to carry on commercial intercourse, consisting in the daily or regular interchange or transportation of passengers and property between Manhattan and Staten Islands, over such waters,

Argument for Appellants.

and to obstruct the navigation of such waters, although carried on by citizens of the United States in steam-vessels duly enrolled and licensed under the laws of the United States, and navigated by masters, pilots and engineers duly licensed under the laws of the United States, thus practically nullifying the laws of the United States regulating commerce and navigation.

After the answers were filed two petitions were presented for a removal of the suit to the Circuit Court, one by all the defendants, on the ground that the suit was one arising under the Constitution and laws of the United States, and the other, by the Independent Steamboat Company alone, on the ground tha' there was in the suit a controversy wholly between that cmpany and the city as to whether the company "had or had ot the right to use and operate its steamboats" in the way contended for, and that this controversy could be fully determined as between them.

A copy of the record in the State court having been filed in the Circuit Court of the United States, that court remanded the cause, and thereupon these appeals were taken, one by all the defendants, and the other by the Independent Steamboat Company alone. The two appeals were docketed in this court separately.

Mr. Roscoe Conkling, Mr. James McNamee, Mr. A. L. Pincoffs, and Mr. Charles McNamee for appellants.-On behalf of Starin and Others appellants the counsel argued in their brief as follows: I. The rule governing jurisdiction is undoubtedly the same, whether the Constitution or a law of the United States is involved in the case. As to that rule, it has been already held by this court, "If a part of a case turns on Federal law, the Circuit Court has jurisdiction." Osborn v. Bank of United States, 9 Wheat. 738. "Cases arising under the laws of the United States are such as grow out of the legislation of Congress, whether they constitute the right, or privilege, or claim, or protection, or defence of the party in whole or in part by whom they are asserted." Railroad Co. v. Mississippi, 102 U. S. 135. "Cases arising under the laws of the United States within the meaning of the Removal Act are

Argument for Appellants.

such as grow out of the legislation of Congress whether they constitute the right, claim, protection, or defence in whole or in part of the party by whom they are asserted. If a Federal law is to any extent an ingredient of the controversy by way of claim or defence, the condition exists upon which the right of removal depends, and the right is not impaired because other questions are involved which are not of a Federal character." Western Union Telegraph Co. v. National Telegraph Co., 19 Fed. Rep. 561.

The removal is claimed in this case because the provisions of the Constitution and Federal laws are ingredients of the defence. If the question arises whether the privileges of a ferry franchise granted by the city of New York came into collision with the rights secured by the coasting license granted by the United States, such a question is a Federal one, whatever this court may think of the merits of the question. See Railway Co. v. Renwick, 102 U. S. 180, and Illinois v. Chicago, Burlington & Quincy Railway Co., 16 Fed. Rep. 706. An examination of the complaint will show that this action is not brought to enjoin these defendants from simply running a ferry in opposition to the one ferry actually established. There certainly is a controversy, presented by the bill, as to the right of the plaintiffs, in virtue of a private property right, to absolutely prohibit these defendants from running any ferry from any point on New York Island to any point on Staten Island.

We claim that the question as to the respective rights of the holders of a coasting license and the grantee of a ferry right such as is claimed by the city of New York has never been determined either by the decision in Conway v. Taylor, 1 Black, 603, or in any of the cases collected in Cardwell v. Bridge Co., 113 U. S. 205, 207. On its face a coasting license does not contain any restriction; it authorizes the running of the boat as many times as is thought proper, and on the general ground that any express authorization to do certain acts includes the authorization of the acts necessary to carry the power into effect, it authorizes the holder to land his passengers and freight. Each limitation of these rights has to be

Argument for Appellants.

justified by a superior right. If this superior right is claimed by an individual in virtue of a grant by the State, and the right of the State to grant that right is contested, this presents a question, and as the court have always held, it is a Federal question. All the different cases, involving the existence or non-existence of such a superior right on the part of the State have been decided by this court on the basis that they involve Federal questions.

II. In the case at bar, the appellees, after alleging that they have certain ferry rights, claim that these rights entitle them to prevent regular transportation between the whole extent of the shores of the islands of New York and Staten Island. This claim, we reiterate, is not inadvertently made; it is a claim which the city has of late years on several occasions sought to enforce; the proceedings in the case of The Mayor v. Clegg, (not reported), which we append to this brief, show that the city considers itself entitled to an injunction against the owner of a boat which runs five times a day, from New York to Coney Island, touching at Staten Island. Whether the right now claimed exists in the city or not is the question raised in the pleadings. Now, one of the main defences brought forward in the case at bar is that the claims of the plaintiffs, as shown in their complaint, to exclusive property rights respecting commercial intercourse between New York and Staten Island, in virtue of what it calls its ferry rights, and their threats and actual interference purporting to be authorized by such claims, all of which are now before this court in this proceeding, have actually abridged and materially obstructed such commercial intercourse, causing great loss to this defendant in its business and "inconvenience and delay to great numbers of citizens residing and doing business in New Jersey and other States." The point, in brief, is that the plaintiffs have broadly claimed the right to prevent all regular transportation between New York and Staten Island, although carried on over links in interstate commerce; to this we interpose a defence that such a claim, if established, would be an obstruction to interstate commerce, which must be "free and untrammelled," according to the construction given by this court of the Constitution and