acquire, hold, or own more than five thousand acres of land in any of the Territories of the United States; and no railroad, canal, or turnpike corporation shall hereafter acquire, hold, or own lands in any Territory, other than as may be necessary for the proper operation of its railroad, canal, or turnpike, except such lands as may have been granted to it by act of Congress. But the prohibition of this section shall not affect the title to any lands now lawfully held by any such corporation.

SEC. 4. That all property acquired, held, or owned in violation of the provisions of this act shall be forfeited to the United States, and it shall be the duty of the Attorney-General to enforce every such forfeiture by bill in equity or other proper process. And in any suit or proceeding that may be commenced to enforce the provisions of this act, it shall be the duty of the court to determine the very right of the matter without regard to matters of form, joinder of parties, multifariousness, or other matters not affecting the substantial rights either of the United States or of the parties concerned in any such proceeding arising out of the matters in this act mentioned.

APPROVED, March 3, 1887.

No. 117.

Retirement of the Trade Dollar

March 3, 1887

A BILL for the retirement and re-coinage of the trade dollar, whose legal tender character had been taken away by the act of July 22, 1876 [No. 100], was introduced in the Senate, December 8, 1885, by John I. Mitchell of Pennsylvania, and referred to the Committee on Finance, in whose hands it remained throughout the session. December 14, 1886, the bill was reported with amendments, and on the 17th passed the Senate. The House referred the bill to the Committee on Coinage, Weights and Measures, which reported it, January 15, 1887, without amendment. February 12 a substitute offered by Samuel W. T. Lanham of Texas was agreed to, and the bill passed, the final vote being 174 to 36. The bill received its final form from a conference committee. The report of the committee was agreed to February 19, in the

Senate by a vote of 49 to 5, and in the House without a division. The bill became law without the approval of the President.

REFERENCES. Text in U.S. Statutes at Large, XXIV, 634, 635. For the proceedings see the House and Senate Journals, 49th Cong., 1st and 2d Sess., and the Cong. Record. The report submitted in the House January 15, 1887, is House Report 3616, 49th Cong., 2d Sess.

An act for the retirement and recoinage of the trade-dollar.

Be it enacted. That for a period of six months after the passage of this act, United States trade-dollars, if not defaced, mutilated, or stamped, shall be received at the office of the Treasurer, or any assistant treasurer of the United States in exchange for a like amount, dollar for dollar, of standard silver dollars, or of subsidiary coins of the United States.

SEC. 2. That the trade-dollars received by, paid to, or deposited with the Treasurer or any assistant treasurer or national depositary of the United States shall not be paid out or in any other manner issued, but, at the expense of the United States, shall be transmitted to the coinage mints and recoined into standard silver dollars or subsidiary coin, at the discretion of the Secretary of the Treasury: Provided, That the trade-dollars recoined under this act shall not be counted as part of the silver bullion required to be purchased and coined into standard dollars as required by the act of February twenty-eighth, eighteen hundred and seventyeight.

SEC. 3. That all laws and parts of laws authorizing the coinage and issuance of United States trade-dollars are hereby repealed.

No. 118. Anti-Polygamy Act

March 3, 1887

In his annual message of December 8, 1885, President Cleveland called attention to the continued spread of Mormonism and polygamy, and the need of further legislation. On the same day a bill to amend the act of March 22, 1882 [No. 105], was introduced in the Senate by Edmunds of Vermont. On

the 21st the Committee on the Judiciary reported the bill without amendment. January 8, 1886, the bill passed the Senate by a vote of 38 to 7. A substitute was reported in the House January 12, 1886, and the bill placed on the calendar, where it remained for the rest of the session. January 12, 1887, the amended bill passed the House. The Senate refused to concur in the House amendments, and the bill was given its final form by a conference committee. The report of the committee was agreed to by the House, February 17, by a vote of 203 to 40, 75 not voting, and by the Senate on the 18th by a vote of 37 to 13. The bill became law under the ten days rule. The principal debate was over the sections dissolving the incorporation of the Mormon Church and denying the elective franchise to women. A joint resolution of October 25, 1893, directed the restoration to the church of the personal property and money of the corporation then in the hands of a receiver, "to be applied under the direction and control of the first presidency of said church to the charitable uses and purposes thereof, that is to say, for the payment of the debts for which said church is legally or equitably liable, for the relief of the poor and distressed members of said church, for the education of the children of such members, and for the building and repair of houses of worship for the use of said church, but in which the rightfulness of the practice of polygamy shall not be inculcated."

REFERENCES. Text in U.S. Statutes at Large, XXIV, 635-641. For the proceedings see the House and Senate Journals, 49th Cong., 1st and 2d Sess., and the Cong. Record. The text of the Senate bill of January 8, 1886, is in the Record, January 12, 1887, House proceedings, where is also the text of the substitute reported in the House June 10. See House Reports 2568 and 2735, 49th Cong., 1st Sess.; House Report 553, 50th Cong., Ist Sess.; Senate Exec. Doc. 21, 50th Cong., 2d Sess. On the constitutionality of the act see Romney v. United States, 136 U.S. Reports, 1; Mormon Church v. United States, 140 ibid., 665; United States v. Mormon Church, 150 ibid., 145.

An act to amend an act entitled "An act to amend section fifty-three hundred and fifty-two of the Revised Statutes of the United States, in reference to bigamy, and for other purposes,” approved March twenty-second, eighteen hundred and eighty-two.

[Sections 1-5 relate to testimony, witnesses and process in prosecutions for polygamy, and the punishment of adultery and other crimes.]

SEC. 6. That all laws of the legislative assembly of the Territory of Utah which provide that prosecutions for adultery can only be commenced on the complaint of the husband or wife are hereby disapproved and annulled; and all prosecutions for adultery may

hereafter be instituted in the same way that prosecutions for other crimes are.

SEC. 7. That commissioners appointed by the supreme court and district courts in the Territory of Utah shall possess and may exercise all the powers and jurisdiction that are or may be possessed or exercised by justices of the peace in said Territory under the laws thereof, and the same powers conferred by law on commissoners appointed by circuit courts of the United States. SEC. 8. That the marshal of said Territory of Utah, and his deputies, shall possess and may exercise all the powers in executing the laws of the United States or of said Territory, possessed and exercised by sheriffs, constables, and their deputies as peace officers; and each of them shall cause all offenders against the law, in his view, to enter into recognizance to keep the peace and to appear at the next term of the court having jurisdiction of the case, and to commit to jail in case of failure to give such recognizance. They shall quell and suppress assaults and batteries, riots, routs, affrays, and insurrections.

SEC. 9. That every ceremony of marriage, or in the nature of a marriage ceremony, of any kind, in any of the Territories of the United States, whether either or both or more of the parties to such ceremony be lawfully competent to be the subjects of such marriage or ceremony or not, shall be certified by a certificate stating the fact and nature of such ceremony, the full names of each of the parties concerned, and the full name of every officer, priest, and person, by whatever style or designation called or known, in any way taking part in the performance of such ceremony, which certificate shall be drawn up and signed by the parties to such ceremony and by every officer, priest, and person taking part in the performance of such ceremony, and shall be by the officer, priest, or other person solemnizing such marriage or ceremony filed in the office of the probate court, or, if there be none, in the office of court having probate powers in the county or district in which such ceremony shall take place, for record, and shall be immediately recorded, and be at all times subject to inspection as other public records. Such certificate, or the

record thereof, or a duly certified copy of such record, shall be prima facie evidence of the facts required by this act to be stated therein, in any proceeding, civil or criminal, in which the matter shall be drawn in question. [Punishment for violation.]

SEC. 10. That nothing in this act shall be held to prevent the proof of marriages, whether lawful or unlawful, by any evidence now legally admissible for that purpose.

SEC. II. That the laws enacted by the legislative assembly of the Territory of Utah which provide for or recognize the capacity of illegitimate children to inherit or to be entitled to any distributive share in the estate of the father of any such illegitimate child are hereby disapproved and annulled; and no illegitimate child shall hereafter be entitled to inherit from his or her father or to receive any distributive share in the estate of his or her father: Provided, That this section shall not apply to any illegitimate child born within twelve months after the passage of this act, nor to any child made legitimate by the seventh section of the act [of March 22, 1882].

...

SEC. 12. That the laws enacted by the legislative assembly of the Territory of Utah conferring jurisdiction upon probate courts, or the judges thereof, or any of them, in said Territory, other than in respect of the estates of deceased persons, and in respect of the guardianship of the persons and property of infants, and in respect of the persons and property of persons not of sound mind, are hereby disapproved and annulled; and no probate court or judge of probate shall exercise any jurisdiction other than in respect of the matters aforesaid, except as a member of a county court; and every such jurisdiction so by force of this act withdrawn from the said probate courts or judges shall be had and exercised by the district courts of said Territory respectively,

SEC. 13. That it shall be the duty of the Attorney-General of the United States to institute and prosecute proceedings to forfeit and escheat to the United States the property of corporations obtained or held in violation of section three of the act of . . . [July 1, 1862]. . . or in violation of section eighteen hundred and ninety of the Revised Statutes of the United States; and