impossible to separate this question of reasonableness from the actual circumstances in which the country found itself at the date of the war. Now, if a stay of execution for three years would not be tolerated in ordinary times, did not these circumstances [then historically known] constitute an emergency that justified the pushing of legislation to the extremest limits of the constitution? In view of the extraordinary circumstances of the case we cannot pronounce it unreasonable. We see in it no wanton or careless disregard of the obligation of contracts. . . Another circumstance which bears on the reasonableness of the enactment is the provision which suspends all statutes of limitation in favor of the soldier during the time he is exempted from process. The provisions were reciprocal and both were reasonable." Where an indefinite stay was provided for on the consent of two-thirds of the creditors, subject to no other than their discretion, the obligation of the contracts held by the non-consenting minority was impaired.2

A statute directing that execution upon any judgment thereafter obtained should not issue until two years after the rendition of the judgment, unless the plaintiff should indorse upon the execution that satisfaction may be received in notes of particular banks, was held unconstitutional. Such a law attempts to impair the obligation. An ordinance, ostensibly to change the

1 See Coxe's Ex'r v. Martin, 44 Pa. St. 322.

2 Bunn v. Gorgas, 41 Pa. St. 441. Townsend v. Townsend, Peck, 1; S. C. 14 Am. Dec. 722. "The contract," says Haywood, J., "is made by the parties, and, if sanctioned by law, it promises to enforce performance should the party decline performance himself. The law is the source of the obligation, and the extent of the obligation is defined by the law in use at the time the contract is made. If this law direct a specific execution, and a subsequent act declares that there shall not be a specific execution. the obligation of the contract is lessened and impaired. If the law in being at the date of the contract gives

an equivalent in money, and a subsequent law says the equivalent shall not be in money, such act would impair the obligation of the contract. If the law in being at the date of the contract gives immediate execution on the rendition of the judgment, a subsequent act declaring that the execution shall not issue for two years would lessen or impair the contract equally as much in principle as if it suspended execution forever; in which case the legal obligation of the contract would be wholly extinguished. The legislature may alter remedies, but they must not, so far as regards antecedent contracts, be rendered less efficacious or more dilatory than those ordained by the law in

jurisdiction of the courts, provided that all contracts, without regard to the terms of payment made by the parties, should be payable in four annual instalments. This was held unconstitutional.1 A law which changes the rules of evidence relates to the remedy and is not within the constitutional inhibition. A law abolishing distress for rent has been sustained as applicable to existing leases. The right to imprison for debt is not a part of the contract. It is regarded as penal rather than remedial. The states may abolish it whenever they think proper.' A law which takes from a mortgagee a right of possession until after foreclosure; a law suspending the right to sue on

the note or bond until after foreclosure; extending redemption; 2 or shortening the redemption,3 impairs the obligation, and is within the prohibition under consideration.

§ 479. Limitation laws relate to the remedy and not directly to the right. They are not considered as elements entering into contracts, for, it is said, parties do not look forward to a breach of their agreements, but to the performance. A law passed subsequently to a contract, and changing the period of limitation, is not necessarily a law impairing its obligation. And ordinarily courts disregard the limitation fixed in the place of the contract or tort and enforce only that of the lex fori. Usually the bar of a statute limiting transitory actions is said not to extinguish the right, because such actions may be brought anywhere, while the statute can have no effect beyond the territory of the sovereign that enacted it; therefore the right remains to support such action whenever the lex fori will permit it to be brought. But even under these statutes, if the subjectmatter of an action and the opposing claimants of the right have continued within the same jurisdiction until the statutory term has expired, the title is transferred to him in whose favor the bar exists, and that title will be recognized and upheld in the tribunals of other states as well.'

§ 480. Vested rights inviolable.--Vested rights cannot be destroyed, divested or impaired by direct legislation. Their protection is one of the primary purposes of government. They are secured by the bill of rights, and the constitutional limita

1 Boice v. Boice, 27 Minn. 371.

2 Robinson v. Howe, 13 Wis. 341; Dikeman v. Dikeman, 11 Paige, 484; Greenfield v. Dorris, 1 Sneed, 550; January v. January, 7 T. B. Mon. 542; Goenen v. Schroeder, 8 Minn. 387. But see Stone v. Bassett, 4 Minn. 298. 3 Cargill v. Power, 1 Mich. 369.

4 Moore v. State, 43 N. J. L. 203; Ogden v. Saunders, 12 Wheat. 313; Don v. Lippmann, 5 Cl. & Fin. 1.

53 Parsons on Cont. 557.

6 Moore v. State, 43 N. J. L. 203; Gulick v. Loder, 13 id. 68; Townsend v. Jemison, 9 How. 407; Edwards v. Kearzey, 96 U. S. 595;

Drake v. Wilkie, 30 Hun, 537; Calhoun v. Kellogg, 41 Ga. 231.

Moore v. State, 43 N. J. L. 203; Newby's Adm'r v. Blakey, 3 H. & M. 57; Brent v. Chapman, 5 Cr. 358; Shelby v. Guy, 11 Wheat. 361; Thompson v Caldwell, 3 Litt. 136; Story's Conf. L. § 5826; Huber v. Steiner, 2 Bing. N. C. 202; Don v. Lippmann, 5 Cl. & Fin. 1; Brown v. Wilcox, 14 S. & M. 127; Davis v. Minor, 1 How. (Miss.) 183; Woodman v. Fulton, 47 Miss. 682; Spencer v. McBride, 14 Fla. 403. See Swickard v. Bailey, 3 Kan. 507.

5

tions upon the exercise of the sovereign powers.' There is a vested right in property which one owns, and it cannot be legislated away. A vested right is property as tangible things are when they spring from contract or the principles of the common law. There is a vested right in an accrued cause of action; in a defense to a cause of action; even in the statute of limitations when the bar has attached, by which an action for a debt is barred. That statute presumes evidence from length of time which cannot now be produced; payment which cannot now be proved." A person in adverse possession is no longer subject to action to disturb him; the one has a vested right to his defense, and the other a title with all its incidents and implications. And it is then secure against legislative interference.8

1 Wilson v. Wall, 34 Ala. 288; Davidson v. New Orleans, 96 U. S. 97; Baugher v. Nelson, 9 Gill, 299; Maxwell v. Goetschius, 40 N. J. L. 383; Collins v. East Tenn. etc. R. R. Co. 9 Heisk. 841; Dash v. Van Kleeck, 7 John. 477; Davis v. Minor, 1 How. (Miss.) 183; Dodge v. County of Platte, 16 Hun, 285; Wood v. Mayor, etc. 34 How. Pr. 501; State Bank v. Knoop, 16 How. 369; Dodge v. Woolsey, 18 id. 331; Greenough v. Greenough, 11 Pa. St. 489; De Chastellux v. Fairchild, 15 Pa. St. 18; Smith v. Louisville, etc. R. R. Co. 62 Miss. 510; Halloran v. T. etc. R. R. Co. 40 Tex. 465; Aldridge v. Tuscumbia, etc. R. R. Co. 2 St. & P. 199; Boatwright v. Faust, 4 McCord, 439; Municipality No. 3 v. Michoud, 6 La. Ann. 605; Steele v. Steele, 64 Ala. 438; Coosa R. Co. v. Barclay, 30 Ala. 120; Dillon v. Dougherty, 2 Grant's Cas. 99; State v. Squires, 26 Iowa, 340; Smith v. Van Gilder, 26 Ark. 527,

2 Lane v. Nelson, 79 Pa. St. 407; Greenough v. Greenough, 11 Pa. St. 489; De Chastellux v. Fairchild, 15 Pa. St. 18; Norman v. Heist, 5 W. & S. 171; Aldridge v. Tuscumbia, etc. R. R. Co. 2 Stew. & Port. 199;

Thistle v. Frostburg Coal Co. 10 Md.
129.

Collins v. East Tenn, etc. R. R. Co.
9 Heisk. 841; Dillon v. Dougherty, 2
Grant's Cas. 99.

* Smith v. Louisville, etc. R. R. Co. 62 Miss. 510.

Davis v. Minor, 1 How. (Miss.) 183. 6 Davis v. Minor, supra.

7 Knox v. Cleveland, 13 Wis. 249; Moore v. Luce, 29 Pa. St. 260; Leffingwell v. Warren, 2 Black, 599.

8 Moore v. State, 43 N. J. L. 207; Maxwell v. Goetschius, 40 id. 383. A statute provided that by partic ular pleading a borrower might de fend against a usurious loan to the extent of the usury. It was regarded as remedial, and though imposing a duty to pay the loan and lawful interest in accordance with the debtor's equitable duty, and made to operate retrospectively in derogation of the statute in force when the loan was made by which the contract was unlawful, it was held not obnoxious to the objection that it took away a vested right, for it was said there could be no vested right to do wrong. Baugher v. Nelson, 9 Gill, 299; Town of Danville v. Pace, 25

After a
When

If a contract when made is a nullity, it cannot be validated by an act of the legislature, for that would be to impose a binding agreement where none existed. A right of redemption once vested is a property right which can only be taken by due process of law; it cannot be abrogated by a legislative act. A lien or other right once attached cannot be destroyed by repeal of the law under which it was derived. tax has been legally remitted it cannot be reimposed. a right has been perfected by judgment the fruits of recovery cannot be diverted by new legislation, nor subjected to new hazard by reviving a new right to appeal, or some other mode of review. An act cannot affect the construction of the will of a testator who died before it was passed. Rights of a husband in the property of the wife when vested cannot be impaired by subsequent legislation. Treaties are the supreme law of the land; rights which have vested under them cannot be destroyed or affected by the action of either the legislative

Gratt. 1; Satterlee v. Mathewson, 16 S. & R. 191; The Ironsides, Lushington, 458.

Boatwright v. Faust, 4 McCord, 439. Statutes prescribing the requisites to be observed in making a will

IN. Y. etc. R. R. Co. v. Van Horn, may be made to operate upon wills 57 N. Y. 473.

2 Willis v. Jelineck, 27 Minn. 18.

3 Appeal Tax Court v. Western R. R. Co. 50 Md. 274; Warren v. Jones, 9 S. C. 288; Daniels v. Moses, 12 S. C. 130; Walton v. Dickerson, 4 Rich. L. 568. The repeal of a general corporation law by a statute substantially re-enacting and extending its provisions does not affect the existence of corporations organized under it. United Hebrew B. Assoc. v. Benshimol, 130 Mass. 325.

already made where the testator dies afterwards. Sutton v. Chenault, 18 Ga. 1; Wynne v. Wynne, 2 Swan, 405. So its provisions may be controlled and their validity affected by legislation intermediate the execution of the will and the death of the testator. Magruder v. Carroll, 4 Md. 335. See Blackman v. Gordon, 2 Rich. Eq. 43. Congress has power to authorize by special act the extension of a patent, notwithstanding the fact that the original patent had pre

4 Municipality No. 3 v. Michoud, 6 viously expired and the invention has La. Ann. 605. been introduced to public use. A

5 Commonwealth v. Welch, 2 Dana, special act of congress authorizing 330.

6 Hooker v. Hooker, 10 Sm, & M. 599; Halloran v. T. & N. etc. R. R. Co. 40 Tex. 465; Burch v. Newbury, 10 N. Y. 374.

7 Stewart v. Davidson, 10 Sm. & M. 351; Johnson v. Johnson, 52 Md. 668.

the extension of a particular patent should be read and construed in connection with the general acts on the subject of patents. Jordan v. Dobson, 2 Abb. (U. S.) 398.

9 Westervelt v. Gregg, 12 N. Y. 202; Bouknight v. Epting, 11 S. C. 71.