as to the intention of Congress, and when we come to look at the provisions of the statute, as amended, we are convinced that Congress did not intend that the amendment should apply to cases where the bond had already been executed, the work done, the respective rights of the parties settled, and the cause of action already in existence. If Congress had intended otherwise, we think it would have still further amended the original act by providing in plain language that the amendment should apply to all cases, and not be confined to the future.

The plaintiff in error contends that where an amendment to an act relates only to procedure, it takes effect upon causes of action existing when the amendment was passed, and hence that part of the amendment in question applies and prevents the taking of jurisdiction by the Circuit Court for the Eastern District of New York. It is admitted by the plaintiff in error that the act is not confined to procedure but deals with substantive rights in some instances, one of which is the provision granting a preference to the United States over all other creditors. In such case counsel admits that the provision must be construed and held to apply to bonds executed subsequent to the enactment of the statute, and to such bonds alone. Under the statute of 1894 no such preference could be obtained. American Surety Co. of New York v. Lawrenceville Cement Co., 96 Fed. Rep. 25; United States v. Heaton, 128 Fed. Rep. 414.

It would follow necessarily that if the full amount of the liability of the surety on the bond were insufficient to pay all the claims and demands, the provision that, after paying the full amount due the United States, the remainder only should be distributed pro rata among the intervenors, would also be a substantive amendment and not one of procedure. Hence counsel admits that the full amount which may be due the United States depends upon whether the bond was executed prior or subsequent to the amendment of the statute; that if the bond were executed prior thereto, the Government is only en

titled to its pro rata share, while if executed subsequently the full amount of its claim, regardless of the claims of the other creditors, would be the amount due. In other words, these provisions, contained in the single section of the act, are to be considered as prospective only and as applicable to bonds executed subsequently to the passage of the amendment.

There is another most important amendment, by which the material-man's right to sue is suspended until after the completion of the work and final settlement and for six months thereafter, during which the United States can alone sue upon the bond. Instead of a right to sue at once upon the nonpayment of his claim, he is precluded from doing so, perhaps for years.

Although the time in which to commence action may be shortened and made applicable to causes of action already accrued, provided a reasonable time is left in which such actions may be commenced (Terry v. Anderson, 95 U. S. 628; Wilson v. Iseminger, 185 U. S. 55), yet that is a different principle from taking away absolutely a present right to sue until a period of time, measured possibly by years, shall have elapsed.

These various provisions are all contained in the same section of the statute, and there is not much of it left to be made retrospective, as matter of procedure, after these other provisions have been held to be prospective only. If the limitation as to the district in which the suit upon the bond could be brought were to be regarded as simply matter of procedure (which we do not assert), we still think it is not to be construed as applying retrospectively. As it is only a question of intention we are not prepared to hold that the section is prospective in its operation in regard to all its other provisions, but retrospective in the one instance, as to the district in which the suit is to be commenced. Even matters of procedure are not necessarily retrospective in their operation in a statute, and we see no reason for holding that this statute, of but one section, should be split up in its construction, and one por

tion of it made applicable to cases already existing and other portions applicable only to the future. We are convinced Congress did not intend such separation. Viewing the whole section, we think Congress meant that only in future cases should the provisions of the amendment apply, although some trifling portion of those provisions might be regarded, technically, as in the nature of procedure. It is therefore wiser to hold the entire section governed by the usual rule and as applying only to the future.

The judgment of the Circuit Court of Appeals was right, and is

Affirmed.

NATIONAL LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA v. NATIONAL LIFE INSURANCE COMPANY.

APPEAL FROM THE CIRCUIT COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE SEVENTH

CIRCUIT.

No. 162. Argued March 9, 1908.-Decided April 6, 1908.

Even if the power to review the determination of an executive department exists, where the complainant is merely appealing from the discretion of the department to the discretion of the court, the court should not interfere by injunction where the complainant has no clear legal right to the relief sought.

Where a corporation has taken the same name as that of an older corporation the fact that it has a greater quantity of mail matter does not justify the court in interfering with a special order of the Post Office Department directing the delivery of matter not addressed by street and number in accordance with Par. 4 of § 645 of the General Regulations of 1902 to the one first adopting the name in the place of address.

THE appellant commenced this suit in equity against the defendants on the eighteenth day of July, 1905, in the Circuit Court of the United States for the Northern District of Illinois,

Eastern Division, for the purpose of obtaining an injunction. against the corporation defendant, restraining it and its manager, the defendant D. G. Drake, at Chicago, Illinois, from receiving, and the Chicago postmaster and the letter carriers named as defendants from delivering, mail-matter directed to "National Life Insurance Company, Chicago, Illinois," to the company so designated, on the ground that, in fact, such mailmatter was intended for the complainant, even though not addressed to it. An answer of the corporation defendant and that of its manager was duly filed and served, to which the complainant filed a replication. After a hearing it was adjudged by the Circuit Court "that the defendant, National Life Insurance Company, is entitled to have delivered to it such mail as may come to the post-office at Chicago addressed 'National Life Insurance Company, Chicago, Illinois,' unless such mail shall also bear the street number of the office of the National Life Insurance Company of the United States of America, or shall be in some other way designated, upon the exterior of the envelope or wrapper containing such mail-matter, or otherwise, as designed for the National Life Insurance Company of the United States of America, and not for the National Life Insurance Company. Wherefore, it is further ordered, adjudged and decreed that the bill of complaint herein, as amended, be and the same is dismissed for want of equity." This judgment was affirmed by the Circuit Court of Appeals.

Upon the trial, among others, the following facts were agreed upon:

An insurance company known as the National Life Insurance Company of the United States of America was duly incorporated by special act of Congress in the year 1868. Its chief office and place of business was, by its charter, located in the city of Washington, District of Columbia. The corporation thereupon entered upon the life insurance business and continued to transact that business and to seek new business of that kind until 1881.

The company was duly admitted to do business in the State of Illinois on or about August 16, 1868, and in the year. 1874 it established in the city of Chicago, Illinois, what is denominated its principal branch office, and thereafter continuously transacted in the city of Chicago nearly all of the business usually transacted at the home office of an insurance company.

In 1881 the company ceased to solicit or to write any new business, and such omission continued until 1900, and during that period the business transacted by it at its principal branch office in Chicago was such as was incident to the care and preservation of the business written prior to 1881. Between those years the company was suffering a natural liquidation, its outstanding policies decreasing from 5,966 in number to 1,317, while its policies in Illinois had decreased from 394 to 100. In the year 1900 the company again began to solicit new business, and up to March, 1904, transacted at its principal branch office in Chicago all of the business usually transacted at the chief or national office of an insurance company.

In March, 1904, the complainant was incorporated under the laws of the State of Illinois, with its principal office and place of business in the National Life building, at 159 La Salle street, in the city of Chicago, and the complainant forthwith took over all the property and business of the Washington, District of Columbia, corporation, and continued thereafter to transact the business theretofore transacted by the latter corporation. Prior to this time (March, 1904) the Washington company had taken over the business of two other life insurance companies and one trust company, all of which had become merged in the Washington company when the complainant took over its business. The Washington corporation still preserves its corporate entity, but since March, 1904, has transacted no business except such as was incident to carrying out the contracts by which the complainant took over its property and business.

The average number of pieces of mail received by the complainant at its chief office in Chicago, intended for it, during