Mr. Justice Harlan, with whom concurred Mr. Justice Day, dissenting:
This case is of sufficient importance to justify a full statement of the facts, as well as the grounds upon which we feel constrained to dissent from the opinion and judgment of the court.
By the final decree under review, the circuit court of appeals for the eighth circuit unanimously reversed the judgment of the circuit court, with directions to give the plaintiff Hoyt, now appellee, the relief asked in his bill.
The general object of the suit was to have it adjudged that the present defendants, Weyerhaeuser and Humbird, now appellants, should hold the legal title to certain lands in Minnesota in trust for the plaintiff, and be enjoined, during the pendency of the cause, from selling, disposing of, or removing, or from attempting to create any charge upon the timber standing or lying upon the premises in question.
Many questions have been discussed by counsel. But there is one which seems to require special examination. The facts out of which that question arises may be thus stated:
The land in question is the southwest quarter of the southeast quarter of section 7, township 54, of range 14 west, principal meridian. It contains 40 acres, and is situated in St. Louis county, Minnesota. It is unfit for cultivation, is valuable chiefly for its timber, has no valuable deposit of gold, silver, cinnabar, copper, or coal upon it, was at the time mentioned in the record uninhabited, and contained no mining or other improvements.
For the purpose of availing himself of the act of Congress relating to the sale of timber land in California, Oregon, Nevada, and Washington territory, approved June 3d, 1878 (20 Stat. at L. 89, chap. 151, U.S.C.omp. Stat. 1901, p. 1545),-which act was amended August 4th 1892, and its benefits extended to all the states (27 Stat. at L. 348, chap. 375, U.S.C.omp. Stat. 1901, p. 1434),-one Richard B. Jones, a citizen of the United States, and admittedly, in all respects qualified under the laws of the United States to enter land, filed, December 17th, 1897, with the register and receiver in the land office at Duluth, a verified written duplicate statement, in due from, indicating his desire to purchase the land in dispute under the homestead laws of the United States. One of these statements was promptly transmitted by the receiver to the General Land Office at Washington.
The receiver, in conformity with law, at once posted in his office, for the required time, the fact of such application, describing the lands by legal subdivision, and furnishing Jones a copy of such notice. That notice was duly published in the newspaper nearest to the land. On the 27th day of March, 1898, no adverse claim to the land having been filed in the land office, the applicant, Jones, after furnishing to the local register satisfactory proofs of the preliminary facts required by law, paid to the receiver the full purchase price of the land, together with all fees legally due to those officers. Thereupon he was permitted, December 10th, 1898, to enter, and did enter the land, the receiver executing and delivering to him at the time an official receipt and certificate of purchase. In December, 1898, all the papers and testimony in the matter of Jones's application, including his certificate of purchase, were transmitted by the register and receiver to the General Land Office at Washington, and by that office were received and filed. On December 19th, 1898, Jones and wife sold and conveyed the land to Minnie Stewart, by deed properly recorded on October 3d, 1902. Stewart and wife conveyed to Hoyt, the present plaintiff, now appellee, and that deed was also duly recorded October 3d, 1902.