Opinion of the Court. Syllabus. avoid appearing, and testifying before the grand jury. If the justice of the peace did his duty, he recognized appellee to appear and testify before that body, and indorsed his name on the recognizance as a witness; and he, no doubt, went before that body in compliance with his recognizance as in obedience to a subpoena. If he started the prosecution in good faith, and with probable cause, as the jury have found he did, we can not see how he could avoid appearing before the grand jury and there giving his evidence, nor could he prevent them from acting upon it when given. We do not see that the instructions could have misled the jury. ΑΠ Nor do we see any error in refusing to give such of appellant's instructions as the court withheld from the jury. All legal propositions they contained, which were applicable to the case, had already been given in his other instructions. This was sufficient. We are satisfied that the parties have had a fair trial, and that the evidence sustains the verdict; and the judgment of the court below is affirmed. Judgment affirmed. PERU BEER COMPANY บ. FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF Peru. In this case no question of law is decided. There was a conflict of evidence as to the fact of a sale, and the court gives its reasons for holding with the jury. APPEAL from the Circuit Court of La Salle County; the Hon. EDWIN S. LELAND, Judge, presiding. Messrs. BLANCHARD & SILVER, for the appellant. Mr. G. S. ELDRIDGE, for the appellee. 62 266 154 655 62 266 63a 279 Opinion of the Court. Syllabus. Mr. JUSTICE BREESE delivered the opinion of the Court: In this case the testimony is very conflicting, the witnesses for the plaintiff and for the defendant testifying directly opposite. In such a state of case we have looked to see where the probabilities lie, and we are satisfied they are on the side of the plaintiff; and this from two facts, about which there is no dispute, and must control the case. These facts are, first, selling the beer by the appellants after the alleged sale to them by appellee, and exercising control over it by drawing it out from the casks and mixing new beer with it to improve its condition; and, second, passing a resolution appointing Throne an agent, to proceed west to make sales of the beer. The jury must have considered these as controlling circumstances in favor of the appellee, and we can not say they are not such circumstances as should have weighed heavily in favor of the finding. As to the instructions, we think the court properly disposed of them, and perceiving no error in the record we must affirm the judgment. Judgment affirmed. JACOB C. RINER v. DARIUS TOUSLEE. 1. CHANCERY PRACTICE—referring to master. On bill for taking an account between partners where the accounts are complex and intricate, the matter should always be referred to a master, to be examined and reported, in order to a final decree; and where the parties, by stipulation to save expense, seek to impose the labor of the master upon the court, this court will not examine intricate and complicated accounts on appeal, but will affirm the decree of the court below. 2. If the complainant in this class of cases should procure an ex parte order for a hearing without a reference, this court would reverse the decrea below for want of a reference to the master. Opinion of the Court. APPEAL from the Circuit Court of Knox County; the Hon. ARTHUR A. SMITH, Judge, presiding. Messrs. CRAIG & HARVEY, for the appellant. Messrs. HANNAMAN & KRETZINGER, for the appellee. Mr. JUSTICE MCALLISTER delivered the opinion of the Court: This was a bill in equity in the Knox County Circuit Court, filed by Touslee against Riner, setting up a partnership, the existence of divers matters of partnership accounts in difference between them, and praying that an account be taken and the balance alleged to be due the complainant be decreed in his favor. To this bill Riner put in an answer, to which replication was filed. After the cause was at issue, the parties, by their solicitors, filed a stipulation, whereby they agreed that the cause was to be tried before the court in vacation, and on such trial the court might hear and consider all proof that might be offered by defendant as to any and all indebtednes due from complainant to defendant, and also all proof offered by complainant as to any indebtedness from defendant to complainant; and if it shall appear, upon a hearing of the cause, that complainant is indebted to defendant, then a decree shall be entered for defendant for any and all sums due him; and in case there shall be found a balance due the complainant, then a decree shall be rendered in his favor for such amount. The court heard the cause in pursuance of the stipulation, and finding the sum of $524.36 to be due from the defendant to the complainant, the court decreed the payment of that sum. Upon the trial several witnesses were examined, and the accounts are evidently complex and intricate. Such accounts are unfit subjects for examination in court, and ought always to be referred to a master to be examined by him and reported, in order to a final decree. The parties can then take Opinion of the Court. Syllabus. exceptions before the master and to the report, and thus bring THE CHICAGO, DANVILLE & VINCENNES R. R. Co. et al. v. FREDERICK SMITH. 1. CONSTITUTIONAL LAW-general rule. The question of the repugnancy of a law to the constitution is one of great delicacy; and the judiciary, in justice to the rights of a co-ordinate department of the State government, ought not, and will not, declare a law to be void, except, upon the most deliberate and mature consideration, its repugnance to the constitution is clearly manifest to the understanding. 2. SAME. The judicial department being created under the constitution to construe and administer the law, has nothing to do with the policy or expediency of an act of the legislature. The mere fact that an act may be mischievous in its effects, burdensome upon the people, in conflict with our conceptions of natural right, abstract justice, or pure morality, or of doubtful propriety, will not justify the courts in holding it to be beyond the scope of legislative authority. 3. TAXATION-corporate authorities. Town officers, under the township system, making an appropriation to a railroad company, in pursuance of law, upon the vote of a majority of the legal voters of the town authorizing the same, are "corporate authorities" of a municipal corporation, who are authorized to levy taxes under the constitution of 1848. Syllabus. 4. TAXATION-corporate purpose. A tax or appropriation for a corporate purpose is one for the benefit of the inhabitants of the municipality. Taxes levied by township authorities to aid in the construction of a railroad is a corporate purpose; and, in this respect, the distinction between a donation in aid of a railroad and a subscription to the capital stock of the corporation, is more shadowy than real. The power is granted in consideration of the public benefits, and these are as great in one case as in the other. 5. SAME--railroads whether private or public. If it were true that railroad corporations are strictly private, that the benefits resulting to the public from the construction of railroads are purely incidental, and that the profits arising from their operation merely enrich the individuals composing the private corporation, it might logically follow that all laws imposing taxes to aid in the building of railroads to be owned and operated by such corporations are unconstitutional, because appropriating taxes to a privato and not a public purpose. 6. TAXATION for a railroad is a public purpose. This court has decided that railroad corporations are created for the public good; to increase the facilities and conveniencies and promote the great ends of commerce; and that they can not organize monopolies, or make contracts injurious to the public interests. The courts for many years past have recognized railroads as public improvements, made to subserve the public interests. When it is also considered that the legislature and the courts have uniformly held that they are of such public use as to justify the exercise of the right of eminent domain, the position is thereby much strengthened that taxation for such an enterprise is for a public purpose, although the distinction between the right of eminent domain and taxation is manifest. 7. SAME. In view of the past history of railroads; the impossibility of dispensing with them; the necessity for an increase in their number, to open more outlets for the products of our fertile and inexhaustible soilfacts all well known to the legislature-this court must hold that, even if the appropriation of taxes in this case was not for a public purpose in the broadest sense, the character of the purpose is involved in such doubt that it can not declare the action of the legislature void. 8. CONSTITUTIONAL LAW-legislative power. In the enactment of laws the legislature must exercise its judgment and discretion. As to questions of pure policy and expediency, no express or necessarily implied constitutional provision intervening, it is the sole judge; and if there be grave doubt as to the nature of the purpose, that doubt must be solved in favor of the action of the legislature. WRIT OF ERROR to the Circuit Court of Will County; the Hon. JOSIAH MCROBERTS, Judge, presiding. Mr. E. WALKER, for the plaintiff in error. |