under $30 per ton, the whole amount of deductions shall not exceed eighty per cent. of such gross yield, value, or return; on all ores, tailings, or mineral-bearing material, the gross yield, return, or value of which is over $30 and less than $100 per ton, the whole amount of deductions shall not exceed sixty per cent, of such gross yield, value, or return; on all ores, tailings, or mineral-bearing material, the gross yield, return, or value of which is $100 per ton or over, the whole amount of deductions shall not exceed fifty per cent. of such gross yield, return, or value; Provided, that an additional exemption of $15 per ton may be allowed on all ores, tailings, or minerals worked by the Frieburg process. "SEC. 2. It shall be the duty of the several county assessors within this State to compare and complete quarterly, on or before the second Monday in February, May, August, and November in each year, a tax list or assessment roll of the proceeds of the mines, alphabetically arranged, in a book furnished them by the board of county commissioners for that purpose, in which book shall be listed or assessed the proceeds of all mines in their respective counties, as provided in this act." "SEC. 6. Every tax levied under the authority or provision of this act on the proceeds of the mines, is hereby made a lien on the mines or mining claims from which ores or minerals bearing gold or silver, or either or any other valuable metal, is extracted for reduction, which lien shall attach on the first days of January, April, July, and October of each year, for the quarter year commencing on those days respectively, and shall not be satisfied or removed until the taxes, as provided in this act, or on the proceeds of the mines, are all paid, or the title to said mines or mining claim is absolutely vested in a purchaser, under a sale for the taxes levied on the proceeds of such mines or mining claims." "SEC. 10. The collection of the tax authorized to be levied under this act shall be enforced in the same manner in which the tax on any other kind of personal property is enforced and collected." What is this manner of enforcement is to be found in section 110 of a previous statute, which reads as follows: "At any time while the assessment roll of any quarter is in the hands of the assessor for collection, the assessor may seize upon the personal property, or so much thereof as may be sufficient to satisfy the taxes and costs of any person, firm, corporation, association, or company who shall neglect or refuse to pay such taxes for one week after such demand of the assessor or his deputy, and shall post a notice of such seizure, with a description of the property and the time and place whereon it will be sold, in three public places in the township or precinct where it is seized, and shall, at the expiration of five days, proceed to sell at public auction, at the time and place mentioned in the notice, to the higher bidder for cash, a sufficient quantity of such property to pay the taxes and costs incurred." From the first section of the statute, we ascertain what it is that is taxed, namely, all the ores, tailings, or mineralbearing material of whatever character, after deducting the actual cost of extracting said ores as mineral from the mines, and other expenses, such as transporting them to the place of reduction, etc. From this it is clear that it is the ore after it has been separated from the bed in which it is found, and its proceeds and products, which are taxed, and not the ore or mineral in the earth. Indeed, this latter idea is not advanced by any one, and it would be preposterous. Ore detached from the soil personal property. As we construe the statutes of the United States, and the recognized rule of the government on this subject, the moment this ore becomes detached from the soil in which it is imbedded, it becomes personal property, the ownership of which is in the man whose labor, capital, and skill has discovered and developed the mine, and extracted the ore or other mineral product. It is then free from any lien, claim, or title of the United States, and is rightfully subject to taxation by the State, as any other personal property is. The truth of this proposition is too obvious to need or admit of illustration or elaboration, and, as we have already said, the pressure of business does not admit of it. In regard to the taxing of this personal property, and the mode of collecting it by sale as provided in the section last cited, it does not seem to us that there can be any reasonable ground for asserting that the United States has any interest in the tax, or in the sale of the property taxed. It is, however, urged with more show of reason that section 6, which makes this tax "a lien on the mine or mining claims from which the ores or minerals, bearing gold or silver, are extracted for reduction," is an interference with the right of property of the government in the lands in which the mineral remains are extracted. An examination of the language we have quoted will show that it was carefully prepared to avoid this objection, and we think it does. The use of the words "mines or mining claims" is evidently intended to distinguish between the cases in which the miner is the owner of the soil, and therefore has perfect title to the mine, and those in which the miner does not have title to the soil, but works the mine under what is well known in the mining districts, and what is, as we have said, recognized by the act of Congress, as a mining claim. In the first case, the statute makes the tax a lien on the mine, because the title to the mine is in the person who owes and should pay the tax. In the other, the tax is a lien only on the claim of the miner; that is, on his possessory right to explore and work the mine under the existing laws and regulations on the subject. That it is so, is shown mining corporation in In the former case, of course, the United States has no interest to be protected, and the State is at liberty to declare and enforce such a lien for her taxes. In the latter, also, such right as the mining laws allow and as Congress concedes to develop and work the mines is property in the miner, and property of great value. most clearly by the conduct of the whose interest this suit is brought, which, for the purpose of evading this tax, permits its investment in this mine, said to be worth from fifty to a hundred million of dollars, to rest on this claim, this mere possessory right, when it could, at a ridiculously small sum compared to the value of the mine, obtain the Government's title to the entire land, soil, mineral, and all. Those claims are the subject of bargain and sale, and constitute very largely the wealth of the Pacific-coast States. They are property in the fullest sense of the word, and their ownership, transfer, and use are governed by a well-defined code or codes of law, and are recognized by the States and the Federal Government. This claim may be sold, transferred, mortgaged, and inherited, without infringing the title of the United States. Why may it not also be made subject to a lien for taxes, and the claim, such as it is, recognized by statute, be sold to enforce the lien? We see nothing in principle or in any interest which the United States has in the land to prevent it. We are of opinion that the decree of the Circuit Court dismissing the bill of appellant on demurrer was right. It is therefore affirmed. Mr. Justice Field took no part in the decision of this case. No. 5. DAVIS v. ALVORD. (Reported in 5 Otto, 545.) Involves laborers and mechanics' liens in Montana, Territory. No. 6. WATER AND MINING COMPANY v. BUGBEY. (Reported in 6 Otto, 165.) 1. The act of March 3, 1853 (10 Stat. 244), granted for school purposes to California the public lands within sections 16 and 36 in each congressional township in that State, except so much of them whereon an actual settlement had been made before they were surveyed, and the settler claimed the right of pre-emption within three months after the return of the plats of the surveys to the local land office. If he failed to make good his claim, the title to the land embraced by his settlement vested in the State as of the date of the completion of the surveys. 2. In this case, the title of the State to the demanded premises being part of a school section, having become absolute May 19, 1866, a mining company could, under the act of July 26, 1866 (14 Stat. 253), acquire no right to them. No. 7. McGARRAHAN v. MINING COMPANY. 1. The statutory provisions prescribing the manner in which a patent of the United States for land shall be executed, are mandatory. No equivalent for any of the re quired formalities is allowed, but each of the integral acts to be performed is essential to the perfection and validity of such an instrument. If, therefore, it is not actually countersigned by the Recorder of the General Land Office in person, or, in his absence, by the principal clerk of private land claims as Acting Recorder, it is not executed according to law, and does not pass the title of the United States. 2. The record in the volume kept for that purpose at the General Land Office at Washington, of a patent which has been executed in the manner which the law directs, is evidence of the same dignity, and is subject to the same defenses as the patent itself. If the instrument, as the same appears of record, was not so executed, and was therefore insufficient on its face to transfer the title of the United States, the record raises no presumption that a patent duly executed was delivered to and accepted by the grantee. 3. The act of March 3, 1843 (5 Stat. 627), in relation to exemplifications of records, does not dispense with the provisions of law touching the signing and countersigning. The record, to prove a valid patent, must still show that they were complied with. The names need not be fully inserted in the record, but it must appear in some form that they were actually signed to the patent when it was issued. 4. The failure to record a patent does not defeat the grant. No. 8. JENNISON, EXECUTOR OF TITCOMB, v. KIRK. (Reported in 8 Otto, 453.) Water Rights and Mining Claims in California. Mr. Justice Field delivered the opinion of the court. In 1873 the plaintiff's testator constructed a ditch or canal in Placer county, California, to convey the waters of a canyon and of tributary and intermediate streams, to a mining locality known as Georgia Hill, distant about seventeen miles, for mining, milling, and agricultural purposes, and for sale. The ditch was completed in December of that year, and immediately thereafter the waters of the canyon were turned into it. The ditch had a capacity to carry a thousand inches of water, and it is alleged that during the rainy season of the year in California, which extends from about the first of November to the first of April, |