Sparrow v. Commissioner of the State Land Office

The Legislature of the State at its session in 1883 passed an act “ to provide for straightening and opening the channel of Cedar river and its east and west branches, and making an appropriation of State swamplands to aid the work, and to authorize the levying of a tax for the completion of the same,” etc. Pub. Acts, 133.

The first section provided that “ for the purpose of aiding in straightening the channel of the Cedar river and its east and west branches, and opening, widening and deepening the same, to the end that the large territory now periodically submerged may be reclaimed, and the…