270 THE USE BOOK. 



States intervene and it is within their province to forbid 

 trespass. Such laws being within the power of Congress, it is 

 not necessary to discuss the question whether it is sovereign 

 power or police power, or what may be its nature, for there is 

 no power vested in the State which can embarrass or interfere 

 with its exercise. 



The appellant makes the further point that a court of equity 

 can not recognize any sovereign right or power in a suitor 

 appearing at its bar, and that the United States, having vol- 

 untarily come into court in its proprietary capacity as a land- 

 owner seeking a remedy, must ask and receive equity upon 

 the same terms and conditions that any private person or cor- 

 poration may. We may concede this to be true. When the 

 United States consents to be sued in a civil court, or resorts 

 thereto for the protection of Government property or redress 

 for injury to the same, it becomes subject to the rules of plead- 

 ing, practice, and law applicable to the case. But it does not 

 and can not waive any of its rights in the subject of the con- 

 troversy, and those rights must be protected by the court. The 

 Government does not appear here in a sovereign capacity, or 

 otherwise than as other suitors in a court of equity. The ques- 

 tion for adjudication is, What are its rights under the averments 

 set forth in the bill, and has the legislature of Montana the 

 power to enact legislation which shall affect the public lands 

 within the borders of that State or interfere with the right of 

 the Government to protect those lands? In Cotton v. The United 

 States (11 How., 220), the court said: "Although, as a sov- 

 ereign, the United States may not be sued, yet as a corporation 

 or body politic they may bring suits to enforce their contracts 

 and protect their property, in the State courts or in their own 

 tribunals administering the same laws." 



The appellant argues that the maintenance of the injunction 

 will impose a grievous burden upon him. But that objection is 

 answered in the Camfield case, in which the court said : " The 

 inconvenience, or even damage, to the individual proprietor 

 does not authorize an act which is in its nature a purpresture 

 of Government lands." And, besides, the appellant may relieve 

 himself of the grevious burden by restoring the Peterson fence. 



The order of the circuit court is affirmed. 



(Indorsed:) Opinion. Filed February 3, 1908. F. D. Monck- 

 ton, clerk. 



[See also IT. S. v. Light (unreported) U. S. circuit court 

 for district of Colorado, April 29, 1908.] 



