S momma uupoursn.
can have adequate relief in a court of law by a suit to recover dam-
, ages for the wrong done, or by mandamus to compel a fulfillment of
` its corporate obligations. These remedies undoubtedly exist; but is
there no other and better remedy for the redress of such wrongs?
Suppose defendant should entirely suspend its operations and refuse
, to run trains upon its road, it would be in default, and everybody
injured thereby could sue and recover the specinc damages sustained.
· But is the public without redress, and are the courts without power
to interfere, at the instance of one or more individuals, and protect
the public as well as individuals from the threatened deprivation of
the benefits and advantages intended to be provided by the building
of the road? Or suppose the defendant should ignore the claims of
some populous neighborhood, whose business justified and whose
I necessities required depot accommodations for the receipt and dis-
charge of passengers and freight, and in this way force the people of
such locality to transact their business through a depot eight or
ten miles distant—is there ho redress except through a multiplicity
· of suits to be prosecuted at law by each injured party, or such relief
as could be obtained through the tardy and inadequate process of
nmndamus? These remedies exist. But they are not the only
means of relief. The defendant, by accepting its charter, assumed
certain obligations in favor of the public in the nature of a quasi
public trust, and the duty·of enforcing the execution of this trust, in
‘ the absence of some statute providing another and different remedy,
devolves upon courts of equity. All matters of confidence and trust
are within their peculiar cognizance. They may restrain or com-
mand, remove a trustee and substitute another in his stead, or exe-
` cute the trust themselves, as the exigencies of each particular case
may require. Their jurisdiction has been well established and de-
i fined. No court, I presume, exercising equity powers would hesitate,
upon proper application, to command the defendant, in the contin-
gencies supposed,to provide a depot or operate its road, for the obvious
reason that the road was authorized and built for and dedicated to
the public, and the public has a right to use it; and if the officers
representing the corporation were to refuse to execute the trusts
repose‘d in them, in the particulars mentioned, or in any other re-
spect, it would be the imperative duty of the courts of equity, on due
application, to interfere, and by an exercise of their extraordinary
powers compel a faithful observance and discharge of all of its obli-
gations. lf these courts can lawfully do this, their supervising
authority over such corporations to the extent of the public interest