Opinion of the Court.

August 28 that the fact was stamped on the entry that the goods were liquidated as entered. There was no change in the classification, and no additional duty was demanded or collected, and the payment made at the time of entering the merchandise for consumption was the payment of duties. Barney v. Rickard, 157 U. S. 352. The original assessment of duty was right, and the final liquidation was the same, and there was no specific provision in the act of 1894 requiring a liquidation at the rates under that act. How then can it be held that the act of October 1, 1890, was intended to be repealed by retroaction?

Moreover, in arriving at the true intention of Congress, we cannot treat section 1 as if it constituted the entire act, but must deduce the intention from a view of the whole statute and from the material parts of it.

By section 2 it was provided that certain enumerated articles should be exempt from duty "on and after the first day of August, eighteen hundred and ninety-four, unless otherwise provided for in this act," and as to those which were dutiable under the act of October 1, 1890, the question arises whether Congress intended such duties should be collected, and refunded after the act of August 28, 1894, went into effect?

By section 23 a license was provided for, and that “from and after the first day of August, eighteen hundred and ninetyfour, no person shall transact business as a custom-house broker without a license granted in accordance with this provision." Since there was no law prior to this, which authorized the collector to require a license from a custom-house broker, it was manifestly anticipated, in using the words, the first day of August, that the bill would become a law before that day.

By section 38, it was provided that on and after the first day of August, 1894, there "shall be levied, collected, and paid by adhesive stamps, a tax of two cents for and upon every pack of playing cards;" and sections 43 and 45 impose a penalty of fifty dollars for every violation of the law incurred by making or selling such cards without affixing the stamps prescribed. Every dealer, if the act were treated as operating retrospec

Opinion of the Court.

tively, would not only be liable for a tax of two cents a pack on every pack of playing cards manufactured or sold or removed from the place of manufacture, and upon every pack of playing cards in stock on and after August 1, but to an ex post facto penalty of fifty dollars for every pack of playing cards that he had sold or removed between August 1 and August 28. Of course these sections cannot be given a retroactive effect according to the terms employed. Again, a higher rate of duty was imposed on many articles by the act of 1894 than under the prior act, and a lower rate of duty on others, while some that were free were made dutiable, as, for instance, the article of sugar. Must duties paid between August 1 and August 28 be refunded where the rate was lowered, and assessed where the rate was raised, or a duty imposed where none existed? Clearly not.

These considerations lead to the conclusion that the act ought not to be construed to operate retrospectively contrary to the general rule, and so as to turn what was intended to secure a period of time to enable business men to act understandingly under the new law into a source of confusion and mischief to the contrary.

In these circumstances we are entitled to avail ourselves of such light as the history of the steps taken in the enactment of the law, as disclosed by the legislative records, may afford. By section 895 of the Revised Statutes it is provided that "extracts from the Journals of the Senate, or of the House of Representatives, and of the Executive Journal of the Senate when the injunction of secrecy is removed, certified by the Secretary of the Senate or by the Clerk of the House of Representatives, shall be admitted as evidence in the courts of the United States, and shall have the same force and effect as the originals would have if produced and authenticated in court."

The certificate shows that the bill passed the House of Rep resentatives February 1, 1894, and that its first section provided that the rates of duty prescribed should be levied "on and after the first day of June," while the second section provided that on and after that day certain articles named, when imported, should be exempt from duty.

Opinion of the Court.

The bill was reported to the Senate by the finance committee, (to which it had been referred,) on March 20, 1894, and "the thirtieth day of June" was substituted in sections one and two for the first day of June. The bill, as amended in the Senate, passed that body July 3, 1894, and sections one and two were amended by substituting the first day of August for the thirtieth day of June. The conference committee of the House agreed to the bill as passed by the Senate without any further amendment, on August 13, and it was sent to the President on August 15. It thus appears that at every stage of its progress the intention of Congress was that the tariff provisions of the bill should operate prospectively, and that as by the concurrence of the House in the Senate amendments the bill did not go back to the Senate, the first day of August remained in the bill as originally fixed in the Senate, July 3, 1894.

Both houses intended that the duties imposed by section one, and the additions made to the free list in section two, should not take effect except at a point of time after the passage of the act. And the Senate endeavored to effectuate that intention by its action on the third of July, but, because of the differences between the two bodies, the passage of the act was delayed, which delay was terminated by the House finally accepting the changes made by the Senate, so that no new date in the future was specifically assigned for section one to go into effect, although the intention that the act should not operate retrospectively was palpable throughout.

And as the act of October 1, 1890 was not repealed by the act of August, 1894 until the latter act became a law, when inconsistent laws were declared thereby repealed, we think it cannot be doubted that Congress intended the rates of duty prescribed by the act of 1894 to be levied on the first day of August, if the bill should then be a law, and if not, then as soon after that date as it should become a law. On the first day of August the duties prescribed by the first section of the act of 1894 could not be lawfully levied, and so far as the importations in this case are concerned and others similarly situated, the law required the exaction of the duties prescribed

Syllabus.

by the act of 1890. As to such importations the first section of the act of 1894 could not be literally carried out, unless by holding it to operate as a retroactive repeal, notwithstanding the saving clause, and this we consider altogether inadmissible. The language of section one was that on and after the first of August there shall be levied, and of the second section, that on and after the first day of August certain enumerated articles when imported shall be exempt from duty. In our judgment, the word "shall" spoke for the future and was not intended to apply to transactions completed when the act became a law.

We regard the third question as too general and unnecessary to be answered, but

Answer the first question in the affirmative, and the second in the negative, and it will be so certified.

GRAND RAPIDS AND INDIANA RAILROAD COMPANY v. BUTLER.

ERROR TO THE SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF MICHIGAN.

No. 198. Argued and submitted January 29, 1895.

Decided June 3, 1895.

The decision by a state court that the pleadings were sufficient to permit the examination and determination of the case presents no Federal question.

While the rule is that this court, upon a writ of error to the highest court of a State, in an action at law, cannot review its judgment upon a question of fact, it is unnecessary to consider the extent of the power of the court in that particular in chancery cases, as this court concurs with the result reached by the state court that when the survey was made of the land in controversy, there was no reservation made of the island, and no act on the part of the government showing any intention to reserve it. In Michigan a grant of land bounded by a stream, whether navigable in fact or not, carries with it the bed of the stream to the centre of the thread thereof.

The court has no doubt, upon the evidence, that the circumstances were such at the time of the survey as naturally induced the surveyor to decline to survey the tract in controversy as an island; that there is noth

Opinion of the Court.

ing to indicate mistake or fraud, and the government has taken no steps predicated on that theory; and that the judgment of the Supreme Court of the State of Michigan was right.

THIS was a bill filed by John Butler in the Circuit Court of the county of Kent, in the State of Michigan, against the Grand Rapids and Indiana Railroad Company and others, to quiet title to certain land in that county, resulting in a decree in complainant's favor, which was afterwards affirmed by the Supreme Court of the State, to review whose judgment this writ of error was sued out. The case is reported 85 Michigan,

246.

Mr. T. J. O'Brien for plaintiffs in error submitted on his brief.

Mr. Willard F. Keeney, (with whom was Mr. Roger W. Butterfield on the brief,) for defendant in error.

MR. CHIEF JUSTICE FULLER delivered the opinion of the court.

The fractional north half of the southeast quarter of section 25, township 7 north, range 12 west, is located on the east bank of Grand River, and early in 1831 that part of the town lying east of the river was surveyed and subdivided, and the east bank of the river was meandered and surveyed. In 1837 the west bank of the river was meandered and surveyed, as were also four islands in the stream, designated as Islands Nos. 1, 2, 3, and 4; and that part of the town lying west of the river was surveyed and subdivided.

The north fractional half of the southeast quarter of section 25 was entered by Lyon and Hastings, September 25, 1832, and patent therefor issued to them November 5, 1833. Butler derived title under Lyon and Hastings, and claimed the land in dispute by virtue of riparian ownership, as taking, under the laws of Michigan, the bed of the stream to the thread thereof.

In 1855 a piece of ground in the river lying opposite land of which Butler's formed a part was surveyed and marked by the deputy surveyor Island No. 5 in Grand River. This sur