The Phosphates of America. 59 



" 2. The royalty was made payable on each ton dug, mined and 

 shipped, not on the rock mined. This was in favor of the grantees. 



" 3. The royalty was made payable quarterly, not annually, this 

 provision to-go into effect immediately and royalty for the two quar- 

 ters of the current year to be paid at once. This was in favor of 

 the State. 



"4. The right, to mine, therefore, if not exclusive, was made 

 exclusive on account of the acceptance of the State's proposals. 



"The original contract was unchanged in every other respect. 

 The royalty remained the same, $1 per ton. The grant was 

 wholly on condition, that is to say, existed so long as and no longer 

 than the conditions were fulfilled. The duration of the grant dur- 

 ing which these conditions were of force was unchanged twenty- 

 one years from 18*70. 



" This is a reasonable construction of a doubtful act by which 

 the doubt is resolved in favor of the sovereign grantor ; it is a 

 familiar rule of construction that when a statute operates as a grant 

 of public property to an individual, or the relinquishment of a public 

 interest, and there is a doubt as to the meaning of its terms or its 

 general purpose, that construction will be adopted which will sup- 

 port the claim of the government rather than that of the individual. 

 Nothing can be enforced against the State." 



This, then, is the present position of affairs, and pending an 

 appeal from this decision the Coosaw Company has refrained from 

 dredging the rivers and will certainly strain every nerve to prevent 

 others from doing so, thereby reducing. the output and quantity 

 of river rock hitherto exported to Europe by about one-half. 



It will have been noticed that in the course of his message the 

 cost of producing one ton of river rock in marketable condition 

 was placed by the Governor at $4.25 per ton, including the $1 

 royalty paid to the State, and that this is a fairly correct statement 

 is borne out by the facts elicited in 1886 by a commission espe- 

 cially appointed by the Legislature to investigate the subject. The 

 same figures apply with equal fairness to the cost of the land phos- 

 phate, as demonstrated by the testimony sworn to by various ex- 

 perts before the examining body and by our own practical investi- 

 gation in the field. With a properly .constructed plant, regular 

 drainage and efficient arid economical management, we find that 

 the total cost of production of land phosphate in clean, dry, mar- 

 ketable condition may be thus stated : 



