Chapter 374. To define the rights of purchasers under mortgages authorized by an Act of Congress approved April twentieth, eighteen hundred and seventy-one, concerning the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company
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CHAP. 374.— An Act To define the rights of purchasers under mortgages authorized by an Act of Congress approved April twentieth, eighteen hundred and seventy-one, concerning the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company. March 3, 1897. *Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled*, Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company.That whenever any mortgage made by the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company under and by virtue of Acts of Congress is foreclosed in any court of the United States, or of any State or Territory thereof, and any sale of the road, equipment, lands, franchises, privileges, and other rights and property covered by said mortgage is made under a decree or decrees of such Purchasers under foreclosure to succeed to franchises, etc.courts, the purchaser at any such sale or sales, and their associates or assigns, shall constitute a new company, which shall have and shall be entitled to hold and possess the franchises and property so sold, and to exercise the same rights, powers, privileges, grants, and franchises, Vol. 14, p. 292.including the franchise to be a corporation, granted by the Act of Congress approved July twenty-seventh, eighteen hundred and sixty-six, incorporating the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company, and by Vol. 17, p. 19;
Vol. 24, p. 123.acts amendatory thereof and supplemental thereto, which were owned and possessed by said Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company, or saidFIFTY-FOURTH CONGRESS. Sess. II. Ch. 374. 1897.623 mortgagees at the time of such decree of foreclosure; and the incorporationIncorporation. as hereby provided shall be completed and become effective whenever the said purchasers and their associates or assigns shall file with the Secretary of the Interior a certificate of incorporation hereunder, duly acknowledged, specifying the name of such new corporation, its president, and the names of its directors, the amount of its proposed capital stock and bonds, together with certified copy of the decree or decrees ratifying such sale; but such new company shall beLiability of new company. subject to all the obligations and duties to the United States which said Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company was subject under its charter or Act of incorporation, and nothing in this Act shall be held to deprive the United States of any right or remedy they may at any time have had against said Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company; but nothing inDebts, etc. this Act shall make such purchasers and their associates or such new corporation liable for any debts or claims or contracts of the old corporation except all debts, demands and liabilities which were due or owing by the old company, which were contracted, accrued, or were incurred or are due or owing for tickets and freight balances, or for wages, work, labor, materials, machinery, fixtures, and supplies of every kind and character, done, performed, or furnished in the repair, equipment, operation, or extension of said road and its branches so purchased, and all liabilities incurred by said old company in the transportation of freight and passengers thereon, including damages for injuries to employees or other persons, and to property, and which debts, demands and liabilities have accrued or upon which suit had been brought or was pending, or judgment rendered, within twelve months prior to the appointment of a receiver or receivers in the foreclosure proceeding or since the appointment of any such receiver, but such liabilities shall not include any liabilities to other railroad companies except for tickets and freight balances: *Provided*, The capital stock of the corporation herein authorized*Provisos*.Capital stock. shall be divided into shares each of the par value of one hundred dollars, and shall not exceed the amount of the mortgage, debt due and unpaid at the time of the decree of foreclosure: *Provided*, That additionalAdditional issues. stock and bonds may be issued by the corporation upon the payment into its treasury therefor the full par value thereof in cash.
No stock shall be issued until the Secretary of the Interior shall approve its issue and certify that, it is issued in conformity to the provisions of this Act. The total stock issued under the provisions of this Act shall not exceed one hundred million dollars. But no stock shall be issued by said corporation, until such issue shall be approved by the Secretary of the Interior as actually representing money, labor or property, estimated at its actual cost value, at the full or par value of said issue of stock: *Provided further*, That nothing herein contained shall be construedLimitation of rights granted. as making any additional grant of lands or other franchises to such successor corporation, or as a waiver of any rights of the United States now existing to enforce any forfeiture of lands heretofore granted to the said Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company, eras in any manner affecting the vested rights of any settler or settlers on any of the lands heretofore granted to the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company or of any purchaser or purchasers of said lands from said company: *ProvidedClaim to land grunt for uncompleted road to be relinquished. further*, That as a condition precedent to reorganization the purchasers of the railroad property and their associates shall relinquish in writing and convey to the United States (by a proper deed or instrument to be filed with and approved by the Secretary of the Interior within six months after the passage of this Act and before this Act shall take effect) all claim, right, title, and interest to all lands granted to the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company embraced within both the granted and indemnity limits, which were adjacent to and coterminous with the uncompleted portions of the road on the sixth day of July, eighteen hundred and eighty-six: *And provided further*, That inLiability to purchasers of land. every case of failure of the title to any lands conveyed or contracted to be sold by said Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company to any bona fide settler and occupant in a tract of six hundred and forty acres or less624FIFTY-FOURTH CONGRESS.
Sess. II. Chs. 374–376. 1897. any and all rights of such purchaser or his assigns, in respect of such land, or in respect of the failure of such title, or in respect to the liability of said Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company on any such contract, shall survive and may be enforced against such successor company with the same force and effect and in the same manner as against the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad Company; and such successor company, upon making compensation for such loss of title or failure to comply with the conditions of any such land contract, shall be subrogated to the rights of such purchaser in respect of the lauds for which such Completion of land sales.compensation shall have been made: *And provided further*, That in case any uncompleted contracts for the purchase of land shall be pending at the time of such foreclosure sale, such new company shall, upon payment to it of any unpaid balance of purchase money for such land at the time provided in such contracts for the sale thereof, convey and release to the holders of such contracts all its title, interest, and estate in and to the land embraced in such contracts.
Sec. 2. Incorporation under State laws.Where the line of such railway is now located within the limits of any state, or where such line is now located within a territory which may hereafter become a state, such state or such territory, when it shall become a state, shall be empowered to require such corporation to become incorporated within such state or states as may be provided by the laws thereof. Sec. 3. Amendment, etc.That Congress shall at all times have the power to alter, amend, or repeal this Act.
Approved, March 3, 1897.