nessee statute, which was claimed in the court below to be broad enough to embrace collateral relatives, is that of 1865-6, c. 40, § 5, carried into Shannon's Compilation as $4179. That act declared that slaves who within the State had lived together as man and wife should be regarded as lawfully married, and that the children of such slave marriages should be "legitimately entitled to an inheritance in any property heretofore acquired, or that may hereafter be acquired by said parents, to as full an extent as the children of white citizens are entitled by the laws of this State." But this statute has been more than once construed as not extending the right of inheritance beyond the lineal descendants of the parents: Sheperd v. Carlin, 99 Tennessee, 64; Carver v. Maxwell, 110 Tennessee, 75. In Sheperd v. Carlin, supra, the question here presented was decided. Agnes Lee, a colored woman, born in slavery, died intestate and without issue. Her land was claimed by her surviving husband under § 4165, Shannon's Compilation, heretofore referred to, and by her niece as her only collateral relative. The court held that the right to inherit the real estate of an intestate born in slavery had been extended only in favor of lineal descendants and that collaterals possessed no inheritable blood. To the same effect are many cases, among them: Tucker v. Bellamy, 98 No. Car. 31; Jones v. Hoggard, 108 No. Car. 178; Williams v. Kimball, 35 Florida, 49; S. C., 16 So. Rep. 783.

Inheritance is governed by the lex rei sita. It is not a natural or absolute right, but the creation of statute law. If one claim the right to succeed to the real property of another as heir and his right is denied because he must trace his pedigree or title to or through an alien, a bastard or a slave, the question is one to be determined by the local law. Cope v. Cope, 137 U. S. 682. Levy v. McCartee, supra. Blythe v. Hinckley, 180 U. S. 333. In Levy v. McCartee, supra, the question was one of inheritance, the

plaintiff tracing his pedigree through an alien ancestor. After first deciding that a question of inheritance to land in New York, was one to be determined by the law of that State, the court held; first, that an alien had no inheritable blood and could neither take land himself by descent, nor transmit it to others; second, that under the law of New York one citizen of the State could not inherit in the collateral line of another when he must make his pedigree or title through a deceased alien ancestor.

It is true that the land of the intestate John Jones was acquired when he was a freedman. Under the law of the State when he acquired it, he had the right to dispose of it by deed or will. If he died intestate leaving issue, it descended to such issue. But if he left no such descendants, it passed, by the express terms of the statute, to his widow.

We are unable to see in the Tennessee Statute of Descent any such denial of the equal protection of the law as is prohibited by the Fourteenth Amendment.

The decree is accordingly affirmed.

MOORE-MANSFIELD CONSTRUCTION CO. v. ELECTRICAL INSTALLATION COMPANY.

APPEAL FROM THE DISTRICT COURT OF THE UNITED STATES FOR THE DISTRICT OF INDIANA.

No. 358. Argued May 5, 1914.-Decided June 22, 1914.

A case otherwise within the jurisdiction of the District Court of the United States and reviewable in the Circuit Court of Appeals is not a case which may come direct to this court under § 238, Judicial Code, merely because in the course of the case a question has arisen as to whether a change in decision of the state court as to the effect

Opinion of the Court.

234 U. S.

and scope of a state statute amounts to an impairment of the obligation of a contract.

Courts of the United States are courts of independent jurisdiction; and

when a question arises in a United States court as to the effect of a change of decision which detrimentally affects contracts, rights and obligations entered into before such change, such rights and obligations should be determined by the law as judicially construed at the time the rights accrued.

Federal courts in such a case, while leaning to the view of the state court, in regard to the validity or the interpretation of a statute, should exercise an independent judgment and not necessarily follow state decisions rendered subsequently to the arising of the contract rights involved.

Where the District Court errs in following later decisions of the state court rather than those rendered prior to the making of the contract, the error may be corrected by the Circuit Court of Appeals or by this court under writ of certiorari but not by direct appeal to this court. A change in decision of the state court in reference to the scope of a state statute held, in this case, not to be a law impairing the obligation of a contract.

THE facts, which involve the jurisdiction of this court of direct appeals from the District Court under § 247, Judicial Code, are stated in the opinion.

Mr. William A. Ketcham and Mr. A. S. Worthington for appellant.

Mr. C. C. Shirley, with whom Mr. W. H. H. Miller, Mr. S. D. Miller and Mr. W. H. Thompson were on the brief, for appellees.

MR. JUSTICE LURTON delivered the opinion of the court.

The primary question concerns the jurisdiction of this court to entertain this as a direct appeal from the District Court.

The decree below was rendered under a general creditors' bill, by which the assets of the Indianapolis, Crawfordsville and Western Traction Company, an insolvent

Indiana corporation, had been impounded, its debts ascertained and the order of payment determined. Among the creditors proving their debts were some claiming liens. One was the Marion Trust Company, trustee under a general mortgage securing an issue of mortgage bonds. Another creditor was this appellant, the Moore-Mansfield Construction Company. That company had, under contract with the Traction Company, constructed a part of its line of railway, and for the balance of its debt claimed a lien upon its property. The decree from which this appeal was taken gave priority to the mortgage and denied to appellant any lien upon the property of the Traction Company and adjudged that its debt as fixed should be paid ratably out of the funds applicable to the payment of general debts.

Counsel for appellant thus states the issue upon this appeal,-"The precise controversy presented by the record is: (a) Has the Construction Company a valid, subsisting enforceable mechanic's lien under the laws of Indiana upon the railway property of the Traction Company? (b) Is such lien senior and paramount to the lien of the trust-deed or mortgage given to secure the outstanding bonds?"

The defense asserted to the mechanic's lien was that there was no statute giving to a contractor for railway construction a lien upon the railway property, and, second, if there existed any such lien, the Construction Company for the purpose of giving security to the holders of the construction bonds had expressly covenanted and agreed to waive and forego whatever right or rights it might have had at the time of the execution of its contract, or which it might thereafter acquire, to claim a lien against the property of the Railway Company under the laws of the State of Indiana.

The court filed no opinion, but the decree recites that "the construction company is not entitled to enforce a

mechanic's lien against any of the property of said defendant traction company in the hands of the receiver of this court or elsewhere, if any; nor against the proceeds thereof, and that no such lien exists."

Thus it is not clear whether the lien asserted was denied because of the waiver referred to or because the statute of Indiana of March 6, 1883, being the statute under which the lien was claimed, did not embrace contractors. Appellant moved the court to amend the decree so as to make it more specific by stating whether it had no lien, because under the law of Indiana a contractor could acquire no such lien, or because it had waived its right to any such lien as contended by the appellee. This motion was denied. We shall assume for the purpose of this case that the lien was denied upon the first ground stated and upon that basis determine whether the case is one which can come direct to this court.

That appellant could have carried this case for review to the Circuit Court of Appeals is plain. The jurisdiction of the District Court under the original bill was based only upon diversity of citizenship. Neither did the contention that in the progress of the case there arose a question claimed to involve the construction or application of the Constitution of the United States deprive the unsuccessful party of the right to go to the Circuit Court of Appeals, where all of the questions would be open to review. But the contention is that the appellant had an election to carry the case to the Circuit Court of Appeals or bring it direct to this court under § 5 of the act of March 3, 1891, 26 Stat. 826, c. 517, now § 238 of the Judicial Code of 1911, as a case "which involves the construction or application of the Constitution of the United States." Shortly stated the contention is, first, that under the decisions of the Indiana Supreme Court prior to the accruing of the rights of this appellant under its contracts, contractors were included within those who might by compliance with