ished shall be one in which the public has an
interest, is no longer an open question. In its general
bearing this principle is too well settled and uniformly
recognized--underlying the adjudications by courts of all
cases involving constitutional provisions--to require more
than a mere statement."

And again he says:

"Nor is it longer necessary to seek a justification of the
common practice of regulating the rates of charges and
general management of railroads on the ground that they have
received valuable franchises of a public nature and had
important powers of sovereign character conferred upon them.
That may be an important political consideration, and as
such may strengthen the argument in favor of the right; but
the right itself rests upon firmer ground, and upon other
considerations than that of pecuniary consideration derived
from the State. The State may regulate their business, not
because they are corporations, nor yet because they are
corporations of a particular kind, but because they, like
the individuals of which they are composed, are subject to
the laws which say that when one devotes his property to a
use in which the public has an interest, he in effect grants
to the public an interest in that use, and must submit to be
controlled by the public for the common good to the extent
of the interest he has thus created."

CHAPTER XI.

RAILROADS AND RAILROAD LEGISLATION IN IOWA.

The first survey for a railroad in the State of Iowa was made in the
fall of 1852. The proposed road had its initial point at Davenport and
followed a westerly course. It was practically an extension of the
Chicago and Rock Island Railroad, which was then being built between
Chicago and the Mississippi River. On the 22d day of December, 1852, the
Mississippi and Missouri Railroad Company was formed, its object being
to build, maintain and operate a railroad from Davenport to Council
Bluffs. The articles of association were acknowledged before John F.
Dillon, notary public, and filed for record in the office of the
Recorder of Scott County, on the 26th of January, 1853, and in the
office of the Secretary of State on the first day of February following.
In 1853 the Mississippi and Missouri Railroad Company entered into an
agreement with the Railroad Bridge Company of Illinois for th