207 U.S. Argument for Appellants. Kierman v. Multnomah County, 95 Fed. Rep. 849; Re Storti, 109 Fed. Rep. 807. Equally untenable is the claim in appellee's bill of complaint, that under the circumstances there described the appellee was deprived of its property without due process of law because it had no opportunity to be heard at the time the assessment complained of was levied against it. Even the ex parte orders and directions of the executive and ministerial departments of the Federal Government affecting property and property rights, constitute due process of law if the party aggrieved may go into a court of equity and obtain redress against the unauthorized or wrongful acts of such officers. Clearing House v. Coyne, 194 U. S. 497. Courts of equity in Illinois furnish complete redress in case the state board of equalization has exceeded its authority, or if its action is palpably wrong. Illinois Central Railroad Company v. Hodges, 113 Illinois, 323. There is no competent evidence in this record tending to sustain the material allegations of appellee's bill of complaint with reference to the assessment complained of. The testimony of the individual members of the state board of equalization in reference to the operation of their minds at the time they made the assessment complained of was incompetent, and should have been excluded by the Circuit Court. The recorded judgments of judicial and quasi-judicial bodies, cannot be impeached by the subsequent testimony of the members of said bodies, as to how their conclusions were arrived at. Wright v. Chicago, 48 Illinois, 285; Quick v. Village of River Forest, 130 Illinois, 323; Ryder Estate v. Alton, 175 Illinois, 94; Washington Park Club v. Chicago, 219 Illinois, 323; Insurance Co. v. Pollak, 75 Illinois, 292; Stock Exchange v. Gleason, 121 Illinois, 502; Packet Co. v. Sickles, 5 Wall. 580; Fayerweather v. Ritch, 195 U. S. 276. The extracts from the reports of the Railroad and Warehouse Commissioners and from the reports of the Board of Agriculture for the State of Illinois were incompetent. Hegler Argument for Appellants. 207 U.S. v. Faulkner, 153 U. S. 109; Chaffee v. United States, 18 Wall. 516; Swift v. State of New York, 89 N. Y. 52; Culver v. Caldwell, 137 Alabama, 125; Gordon v. Bucknell, 38 Iowa, 438; State v. Krause, 58 Kansas, 651; Wellington v. Railroad Co., 158 Massachusetts, 185; Jones v. Guano Co., 94 Georgia, 14; State v. Wells, 11 Ohio, 261. The figures taken from the books of the Union Stock Yard and Transit Company and from Brown's Directory of American Gas Companies were not competent evidence and should have been excluded. Private publications, whether written or printed, are incompetent as evidence, unless accompanied by the testimony of the person who compiled the information, to the effect that the compilations therein made are true, of his own personal knowledge. Seymour v. McCormick, 19 How. 96; Langley v. Smith, 3 N. Y. St. Rep. 276; State v. Daniels, 44 N. H. 383; Richardson v. Stringfellow, 100 Alabama, 416; Cooke v. Slate Co., 36 Ohio St. Rep. 135; Spalding v. Hedges, 2 Pa. St. 240. If the contention of appellee be sound, that the reassessment of 1900 was void and illegal because the board had exhausted its power in making the first assessment, then appellee had an adequate remedy at law, for it could have paid the void. assessment and then have recovered the money back. The Supreme Court of Illinois held that the first assessment was fraudulent and void, and affirmed the judgment of the state circuit court directing the making of the second. A construction placed by the highest court of the State upon the taxing laws of that State is binding upon a Federal court. State Railroad Tax Cases, 92 U. S. 575, 618. Where a tax is illegal and void and can be paid under protest and then recovered back from the collector, the aggrieved party has an adequate remedy at law, and a court of equity will not assume jurisdiction. Shelton v. Platt, 139 U. S. 591. Overvaluation of property by an assessing body, unaccompanied with fraud or bad faith, furnishes no ground for equitable intervention. State Railroad Tax Cases, 92 U. S. 575; Railroad Co. v. Backus, 154 U. S. 421; Maish v. Arizona, 164 U. S. 599. Mr. William G. Beale for The Chicago Edison Company and The Chicago Telephone Company, with whom Mr. Gilbert E. Porter, Mr. Buell McKeever, Mr. Waldo F. Tobey, Mr. Charles S. Holt and Mr. William P. Sidley were on the briefs; Mr. James F. Meagher for The People's Gas Light and Coke Company; Mr. John P. Wilson for The Chicago City Railway Company. Mr. John S. Miller and Mr. Merritt Starr filed a brief for the South Chicago City Railway Company; Mr. William W. Gurley, Mr. Arthur Dyrenforth, Mr. Isaac M. Jordan and Mr. Howard M. Carter filed a brief for The Chicago Consolidated Traction Company; and Mr. William W. Gurley, Mr. Arthur Dyrenforth and Mr. Howard M. Carter filed a brief for The Chicago Union Traction Company:1 Although to make out a case under the Fourteenth Amendment it must be shown that the act complained of is the act of the State; the prohibitions of the amendment refer to all instrumentalities of the State-to its legislative, executive and judicial authorities and, therefore, whoever by virtue of public position under a state government deprives another of any right protected by the amendment against deprivation by the State violates the constitutional inhibition and, as he acts in the name of the State and for the State, and is clothed with the State's power, his act is that of the State. Were that not so, the constitutional prohibition would have no meaning and the State would be placed in the position of having clothed one of its agents with power to annul or evade the Constitution of the United States. Ex parte Virginia, 100 U. S. 339-347; C., B. & Q. R. R. v. Chicago, 166 U. S. 226; Scott v. McNeal, 154 U. S. 34; Regan v. Farmers Loan & Trust Co., 154 U. S. 362; Neal v. Delaware, 103 U. S. 370; Coulter v. L. & N. Ry. 1 For other cases argued simultaneously herewith, see post, p. 42. Argument for Appellees. 207 U. S. Co., 196 U. S. 599; Williams v. Mississippi, 170 U. S. 213; Chi Lung v. Freeman, 92 U. S. 275; Soon King v. Crowley, 113 U. S. 703; Arrowsmith v. Harmoning, 118 U. S. 194; Yick Wo v. Hopkins, 118 U. S. 356; Railroad and Telephone Cos. v. Board of Equalizers, 85 Fed. Rep. 302; Nashville, C. & St. L. Ry. v. Taylor, 86 Fed. Rep. 168; Taylor v. L. & N. R. Co., 88 Fed. Rep. 350; Louisville Trust Co. v. Stone, 107 Fed. Rep. 305. The collection of the taxes extended upon the reassessment of the capital stock of appellee made by the state board of equalization, will deprive appellee of its property without due process of law. Every step, regulation and provision in any proceeding under the law of a State making for the protection of a person's rights or property must be observed. C., B. & Q. R. R. v. Chicago, 166 U. S. 226. The action of the state board did not constitute due process of law. The members of the state board did not exercise their judgment. The exercise of such judgment is an indispensable element of due process. In considering whether due process has been had, this court has frequently said it is the substance that the law regards, not the form. An exercise of the judicial officer's judgment, in whatever legal form it may have been made, is the substance of a trial, or of an assessment. C., B. & Q. R. R. Co. v. Paddock, 75 Illinois, 616. The state board of equalization did not equalize the assessment so made with the assessments of other property in the State of Illinois. Equalization is the primary duty of the board, both with reference to assessments within the original jurisdiction of the local assessors and assessments within the original jurisdiction of the state board of equalization. Railroad Co. v. Taylor, 86 Fed. Rep. 184; Law v. People, 87 Illinois, 405; Railroad and Telephone Cos. v. Board of Equalizers, 85. Fed. Rep. 302 (305, 306). The reassessments made by the state board are so grossly excessive as to amount to fraudulent assessments. People ex rel. Goggin v. Board of Equalization, 191 Illinois, 529. Other corporations of the same class were not assessed on the same basis. Discrimination and unauthorized classification are contrary to the principle of equality in taxation prescribed by the constitution and statutes of Illinois and a discriminating assessment does not constitute a due observance of the regulations of the law of the land made for the protection of appellee's rights, under the definition of due process above referred to: Cummings v. Bank, 101 U. S. 153. MR. JUSTICE PECKHAM, after making the foregoing statement of facts, delivered the opinion of the court. The claim that the action of the state board of equalization in making the assessment under consideration was the action of the State, and if carried out would violate the provisions of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, by taking property of the appellee without due process of law, and by failing to give it the equal protection of the laws, constitutes a Federal question beyond all controversy. How that question should be decided is another matter which we will proceed at once to discuss. The state board of equalization is one of the instrumentalities provided by the State for the purpose of raising the public revenue by way of taxation. In regard to corporations of the class of which the appellee and the other corporations involved here are members, it is the duty of that board to make an original assessment upon them. From the decision of the board in making such assessment no appeal is provided for, and such decision is therefore conclusive, except as proceedings for relief may thereafter be taken in the courts. As to the assessments of local assessing bodies, the board is one of review, but its decisions are equally conclusive, as in the case of original assessments. Acting under the constitution and laws of the State, the board therefore represents the State, and its action is the action of the State. The provisions of the Fourteenth |