"Respecting negotiable bonds issued under legislative authority, by municipalities for such and kindred purposes, when in the hands of _bona fide_ holders, the supreme court of the United States, influenced, doubtless, by a keen sense of the injustice and odium of repudiation, has at all times displayed a strong determination effectually to enforce payment. Accordingly it has refused to follow the subsequent decisions of the state courts against the validity of such bonds, in cases where the prior rulings of the state courts had been in favor of the power to issue them; it has adopted liberal constructions of statutes and charters authorizing the creation of such debts; it has given no favor to defences based upon mere irregularities in the issue of the bonds, or non-compliance with preliminary requirements, not going to the question of the power to contract; and has held that the circuit courts of the United States were clothed with full power and authority by _mandamus_, or otherwise, to enforce the collection of judgments rendered therein on such bonds, and that this authority could not in the least be interfered with, either by the legislature or the judiciary of the states." It will be seen that for the purpose of relieving railroad companies from their liabilities as guarantors, on bonds issued to them by municipalities (for these bonds were uniformly so guaranteed), the supreme court of the United States has declared the statutes of states, and the decisions of state courts, absolutely null and void. In violation of both the letter and spirit of the constitution, in order to compel the payment of bonds issued without authority, and in violation of every principle known to the law, it has said that these bonds must be paid because they are in the hands of _bona fide_ holders. This same court, as we will hereafter show, when the holders of bonds issued by railroad companies were asking payment, has released the companies from their written agreement to pay in coin, and compelled the holders to take at par depreciated paper. When the bondholders are demanding payment from the people, of the bonds issued without authority, the court, in order to compel payment, nullifies state government; but when these same bondholders demand that railroad companies shall live up to their written contracts, have decided that they need not do so. It fears the stigma of repudiation when the people are called upon to pay, but when the call is made upon corporations it decided in favor of repudiation. Our author continues: "It has upheld and protected the rights of such creditors with a firm hand, _disregarding at times, it would seem, principles which it applied in other cases, and asserts the jurisdiction and authority of the federal courts with such striking energy and vigor as apparently, if not actually, to trench upon the lawful rights of states and the acknowledged powers of the state tribunals_."