In conclusion of this subject it is to be observed that the principle of the non-amenability of the States of the Union to suit does not extend to their political subdivisions. These may be sued in contract, and even in tort, money judgments may be rendered against them, and mandamus may be awarded to compel the necessary appropriation and the levying and collection of taxes to pay the judgments thus rendered. In some cases also, the private property of such public corporations which is not directly used in the public service may be sold, on execution.84 As regards this liability to suit, there is, however, a distinction to be made between municipal corporations, and those known as quasi-municipal. The latter may not be sued in tort except by express statutory permission. The former, however, may be sued in tort, since they are deemed to be organized for the peculiar advantage of those living within their areas, and thus not acting, as it were, as the agent of the sovereignty, do not enjoy its special exemptions, but are subject to the rules of private law.

81 Justice Harlan rendered a dissenting opinion, maintaining as he had in a dissent in Belknap v. Schild, that, under the doctrine declared in United States v. Lee, the court would be empowered to enjoin the defendants individually. "I am of the opinion," he said, "that every officer of the government, however high his position, may be prevented by injunction, operating directly upon him, from illegally injuring or destroying the property rights of the citizen; and this relief should more readily be given when the government itself cannot be made a party of record.

"The courts may, by mandamus, compel a public officer to perform a plain, ministerial duty prescribed by law; and that may be done, although the government itself cannot be made a party of record. Can it be possible that the court is without authority to enjoin the same officer from doing a direct, affirmative wrong to the property rights of the citizen, upon the ground that the government whom he represents, and in whose interest he is acting, is not and cannot be made a party of record? The present decision - erroneously, I take leave to say - answers this question favorably to the defendant. But that answer cannot, I submit, be made consistently with the declaration which this court has often repeated, that no officer of the law, however high his position, can set that law at defiance with impunity; that the government, as well as the citizen, is subject to the Constitution, and therefore cannot legally appropriate or use a patented invention without just compensation any more than it can appropriate or use, without compensation, land that it had patented to a private purchaser."

82 185 U. S. 373; 22 Sup. Ct. Rep. 650; 46 L. ed. 954.

83 202 U. S. 60; 26 Sup. Ct. Rep. 568; 50 L. ed. 935.

It is, however, to be observed that in so far as these municipal corporations may properly be held to represent the sovereignty and to exercise purely governmental powers, they are not generally held responsible for damages arising from the exercise of such powers.