Rights of Things. It is its character of property only which imparts to it value, and alone authorizes in individuals a right of action for invasions or disturbances of its enjoyment. Vide B. Com. vol. iii. chap. 16, p. 236, as to injuries to this description of private property,' and the remedies given for redressing them. A franchise, therefore, to erect a bridge, to construct a road, to keep a ferry, and to collect tolls upon them, granted by the authority of the State, we regard as occupying the same position with respect to the paramount power and duty of the State to promote and protect the public good, as does the right of the citizen to the possession and enjoyment of his land under his patent or contract with the State; and it can no more interpose any obstruction in the way of their just exertion. Such exertion we hold to be not within the inhibition of the Constitution, and no violation of a contract. The power of a State, in the exercise of eminent domain, to extinguish immediately a franchise it had granted, appears never to have been directly brought here for adjudication, and consequently has not been heretofore formally propounded from this court. But in England, this power to the fullest extent was recognized in the case of the Governor and Company of the Cast-Plate Manufacturer v. Meredith, 4 Term Reports, 794; and Lord Kenyon, especially in that case, founded solely upon this power the entire policy and authority of all the road and canal laws of the kingdom," pp 533, 534. Woodbury, J., in a concurring opinion, limited the power of eminent domain over the franchise of a corporation to cases where " the further exercise of the franchise, as a corporation, is inconsistent or incompatible with the highway to be laid out," and where also •'a clear intent is manifested in the laws that one corporation and its uses shall yield to another, or only authorize a party to make a bridge, but give to the same party, in express terms, the exclusive right to build a bridge within distant termini, on the one side and the other? This seems to be well settled; nor does it interfere with the eminent domain of the State, for this exclusive right would be a franchise, and this is a property, and it can therefore be taken for public purposes, that is, another bridge may be authorized within these same limits, on making compensation, (r)

But let us suppose the grant not to be in terms of any exclusive right, but simply a right to build a bridge from one spot to another, and that this grant contains a clause, promising, on the part of the State, that no party shall ever be authorized to build another bridge within five miles, in either direction, from either terminus. Would this promise be binding on future legislatures? (s) We confess that we think the question is one *of some difficulty. If no future legislature can authorize another bridge within the five miles on payment of compensation, it must be because this legislature has granted away from the public, for all time, this right of eminent domain. We are clear they cannot do this. And if it be the certain effect of this promise, that no such other bridge can hereafter be authorized on any terms, then we say the promise is void, be-cause the legislature, as an agent, had made a contract which they had no authority whatever to make. But why may not a future legislature authorize another bridge, with compensation, in this case, as well as if an exclusive right had been given?

Saratoga and Schenectady R. R Co 3 Paige, 45; Lexington and Ohio R. R. Co. v. Applegate, S Dana, 289; Shorter v. Smith, 9 Ga 17. And the legislature, in delegating this power to a railroad company, need not designate the specific land to be taken. Boston Water Power Co v. Boston and Worcester R R. Co. 23 Pick. 360

(r) West River Bridge. Co. v. Dix, 6 How. 507; Shorter v. Smith, 9 Ga. 529. The exclusive right is a part of the franchise, which may itself be taken. Piscat-aqua Bridge v. N. H Bridge, 7 N H. 35. See also Greenwood v. Freight Co. 105 U. S. 13

(s) In the Richmond, etc R. R. Co. v. The Louisa R. R. Co. 13 How. 71, 90, Curtis, J., contended for the power of the legislature to make such a contract, but the court declined to pass upon the question See Piscataqua Bridge v. N. H. Bridge, 7 N. H. 35, 69.

The answer may be, that no property and no franchise whatever is given by the promise, and nothing but a bare promise made. The bridge itself may be taken, for it is property, or the right to build the bridge may be taken, for this is a franchise, and a franchise is property, but no property passes by a mere promise that no other bridge shall be built; and if no property passes, there is nothing which can be taken in making compensation, and then there is no way of exercising this right of eminent domain, or, which is the same thing, this right of eminent domain has been transferred or destroyed, which, as we have seen, cannot legally be done. Such might be the argument, and, although technical, we do not deny its force; nor shall we be able to answer this question with certainty, until it is settled by further adjudication. But at present we regard it as a question between a technical view of the subject and a substantial view of it; and we believe that the courts would construe such a grant with such a promise, as in fact a grant of an exclusive right, and would apply to it the same rule of law, permitting them to take this right away on making compensation, (t)

(t) The Enfield Toll Bridge Co.v. The Hartford & N H. R. 11. Co 17 Coun. 40, 454. In the plaintiff's charter, granted in 1798, for the building of a bridge over Connecticut River, between Enfield and Suffield. it was provided, that no perron or persons should have liberty to build another bridge over that river, between the north line of Enfield and the south line of Windsor, during the continuance of the charter. The legislature, in 1835, granted a charter to the defendants to construct a railroad from Hartford to the north line of the State, and thence to Springfield, Mass., and to build a bridge across the Connecticut for the purposes of a railroad track exclusively; and it was also provided in the charter, that nothing therein contained should be construed to prejudice or impair the rights then vested in the plaintiffs. The railroad was laid out in the most direct and feasible route, and the company proceeded to construct a bridge for railroad purposes only, within the exclusive limits of the Enfield Toll Bridge. It was held, that a railroad, though belonging to a "private corporation," is a "public use;" and the franchise of a toll-bridge " private property," within the meaning of the Constitution; that the franchise of a toll-bridge may be taken for the purposes of a railroad, by granting compensation; that the covenant in this case was a part of the contract creating the corporation, and was a part of the franchise itself, and subject to the same laws; that the reservation in the defendant's charter, that nothing therein should be construed to impair the plaintiffs rights, did not protect them from the exercise of the power of eminent domain, but only secured them equal rights,- the rignt to demand compensation if their franchise should be impaired by the construction of the road. The case of the Boston & Lowell Railroad Co. v The Salem & Lowell, the Boston & Maine, and the Lowell & Lawrence Railroad Companies, 2 Gray, 1, turned upon a question quite similar to that considered in the text. In 1830 the plaintiffs were incorporated to make a railroad from Boston to Lowell. The twelfth section of their charter enacted, "That no other railroad shall, within thirty years, be authorized to be made from Boston, Cambridge, or Charlestown, to Lowell, or to any place within five miles from the northern termination of the Boston and Lowell Railroad." Afterwards, the three defendant companies were successively incorporated: and by their junction and intersection, there was a direct railroad route from Lowell to Boston. And this action was a suit in equity, praying for an injunction against the defendants. The court did not decide that the acts incorporating the three defendant railroad companies were unconstitutional; for this obvious reason, that