That ruling was reaffirmed and followed in Mullan v. United States, 118 U. S. 271, where valuable coal lands, known to be such, were held not to be open to selection by the State as indemnity school lands.

The conditions ensuing from the discovery of gold and other minerals in the western States and Territories resulted in a general demand for a system of laws expressly opening the mineral lands to exploration, occupation and acquisition, and Congress, responding to this demand, adopted from 1864 to 1873 a series of acts dealing with practically every phase of the subject and covering all classes of mineral lands, including coal lands.1 These acts, with some before noticed, were carried into a chapter of the Revised Statutes entitled "Minerals Lands and Mining Resources." Taken collectively they constitute a special code upon that subject and show that they are intended not only to establish a particular mode of disposing of mineral lands, but also to except and reserve them from all other grants and modes of disposal where there is no express provision for their inclusion. Thus the policy of disposing of mineral lands only under laws specially including them became even more firmly established than before, and this is recognized in our decisions. Mining Co. v. Consolidated Mining Co., supra, 174; Deffeback v. Hawke, 115 U. S. 392, 402; Davis v. Weibbold, 139 U. S. 507, 516. And while the mineral-land laws are not applicable to all the public land States, some being specially excepted, there has been no time since their enactment when they were not applicable to Utah.

1 Acts July 1, 1864, c. 205, § 1, 13 Stat. 343; March 3, 1865, c. 107, § 1, 13 Stat. 529; July 26, 1866, c. 262, 14 Stat. 251; July 9, 1870, c. 235, 16 Stat. 217; May 10, 1872, c. 152, 17 Stat. 91; March 3, 1873, c. 279, 17 Stat. 607.

2 Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Missouri, Kansas, Alabama and Oklahoma have been wholly or partly excepted. Acts February 18, 1873, c. 159, 17 Stat. 465; May 5, 1876, c. 91, 19 Stat. 52; March 3,

Another statute indicative of the policy of Congress and pertinent to the present inquiry is the Act of February 28, 1891, c. 384, 26 Stat. 796, which defines the indemnity to which a State or Territory is entitled in respect of its school grant. In addition to dealing with deficiencies occurring in other ways, it provides, "And other lands of equal acreage are also hereby appropriated and granted, and may be selected by said State or Territory where sections sixteen or thirty-six are mineral land." In this there is a plain implication that where those sections are mineral-known to be so when the grant takes effect-they do not pass under the grant. And it does not militate against this implication that under another provision the State may surrender those sections and take other lands in lieu of them where, although not known to be mineral when the grant takes effect, they are afterwards discovered to be so. See California v. Deseret Water &c. Co., 243 U. S. 415.

What has been said demonstrates that the school grant to Utah must be read in the light of the mining laws, the school land indemnity law and the settled public policy respecting mineral lands, and not as though it constituted the sole evidence of the legislative will. United States v. Barnes, 222 U. S. 513, 520. When it is so read it does not, in our opinion, disclose a purpose to include mineral lands. Although couched in general terms adequate to embrace such lands if there were no statute or settled policy to the contrary, it contains no language which explicitly or clearly withdraws the designated sections, where known to be mineral in character, from the operation of the mining laws, or which certainly shows that Congress intended to depart from its long prevailing policy of disposing of mineral lands only under laws specially including them.

1883, c. 118, 22 Stat. 487; March 3, 1891, c. 543, 26 Stat. 1026; June 6, 1900, c. 813, 31 Stat. 680.

It therefore must be taken as neither curtailing those laws nor departing from that policy.

This conclusion is fortified by other considerations. When the grant was made Utah was known to be rich in minerals and salines. Besides this grant the act contains others aggregating 1,570,080 acres. In none is there any mention of mineral lands. As to 110,000 acres there is an express inclusion of saline lands. This silence as to mineral lands, when contrasted with the special inclusion of saline lands, indicates that the former are not included. See Montello Salt Co. v. Utah, 221 U. S. 452, 466. The committees of Congress, upon whose recommendation the act was passed, construed it as not embracing mineral lands, for in their reports 1 they stated that “All mineral lands are exempt from any grant made under the act." The Land Department has uniformly placed the same construction upon it.2 And Congress acted upon that construction when, by the Act of May 3, 1902, c. 683, 32 Stat. 188, it declared that as to the State of Utah "all the provisions" of the school land indemnity law of February 28, 1891, before noticed, should apply to sections 2 and 32 as well as to sections 16 and 36,-the grant to that State covering all of these sections instead of the latter two as in other western States.

1

The case of Cooper v. Roberts, 18 How. 173, is relied upon as making for a different conclusion. Part of a school section in Michigan known to be mineral was there in controversy and was held to have passed to the State under its school grant. At the time the section was surveyed, which was the date when the grant was to take effect, there was a statute which in a single section provided for

1 House Report No. 162, 53d Cong., 1st sess., p. 18; Senate Report No. 414, 53d Cong., 2d sess., p. 19.

2 Utah v. Allen, 27 L. D. 53; Richter v. Utah, 27 L. D. 95; State of Utah, 29 L. D. 69; State of Utah, 32 L. D. 117; Mahoganey No. 2 Lode Claim, 33 L. D. 37; Charles L. Ostenfeldt, 41 L. D. 265.

the sale of mineral lands, and also of other lands, and concluded with a reservation of the school sections "from such sales." The real question was. whether those sections were reserved from both classes of sales, and this the court answered in the affirmative. Some observations in the opinion are not in accord with our present conclusion. These were relied upon in Mining Co. v. Consolidated Mining Co., supra, as our records show, and were in effect disapproved. Besides, when they were made the public policy respecting mineral lands had not been expressed in general and permanent laws, such as were afterwards enacted and carried into the Revised Statutes. See Lindley on Mines, 3d ed., § 136. The case, therefore, is neither controlling nor persuasive here.

It results that the decree of the Circuit Court of Appeals must be reversed and that of the District Court affirmed.

It is so ordered.

MR. JUSTICE MCREYNOLDS did not participate in the consideration or decision of this case.

NORTHERN OHIO TRACTION. & LIGHT COMPANY ET AL. v. STATE OF OHIO ON THE RELATION OF PONTIUS, PROSECUTING ATTORNEY OF STARK COUNTY, OHIO.

ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF OHIO.

No. 60. Argued October 18, 19, 1917.-Decided January 28, 1918. Where there are no controlling provisions in state constitution or statutes and no prior adjudication by its courts to the contrary, a franchise for an interurban electric railway, granted by the proper state

authority without limit as to duration, and in the absence of circumstances showing an intention to give or accept a mere revocable right, is a contract not subject to annulment at the will of the granting authority.

Under the constitution and statutes of Ohio in 1892, county commissioners had power to grant franchises over public roads valid for twenty-five years, if not perpetually.

A resolution of county commissioners purporting to revoke an electric railway franchise, and treated by the state court as having that effect, amounts to state action, and, the franchise not being so revocable, such resolution impairs its obligation and is void.. Upon review of a judgment erroneously treating a franchise as revocable at the will of a board of county commissioners and upholding the board's resolution purporting to revoke it, the court is not called upon to determine whether the franchise term has since expired by limitation, or whether the state legislature (which has not acted) may have reserved power to revoke or repeal the franchise. 93 Ohio St. 466, reversed.

THE case is stated in the opinion.

Mr. John C. Welty and Mr. Joseph S. Clark, with whom Mr. John C. Weadock was on the briefs, for Northern Ohio Traction & Light Co.

Mr. W. T. Holliday filed a brief for Cleveland Trust Co., plaintiff in error.

Mr. Frank N. Sweitzer and Mr. Hubert C. Pontius for defendant in error.

Mr. JUSTICE MCREYNOLDS delivered the opinion of the court.

The Northern Ohio Traction & Light Company through successive assignments from William A. Lynch acquired the interurban electric railroad between Canton and Massillon, Ohio, October, 1906; The Cleveland Trust Company is trustee under a mortgage on the road intended to