The State which grants a charter to a railway corporation may, as a condition precedent to the grant, stipulate that the company shall pay into the State's treasury a certain percentage of its receipts, or be liable to a certain tax on the amount of its capital stock, or to a special property tax, and the fact that these receipts are derived from its interstate commerce business, or that its property is so employed does not render the stipulation void. The sums so paid are not paid because of the interstate commerce done, but as a payment to the State for the charter which it has ob-tained, and which the State could grant or withhold as it might see fit.29

But a State may not in a charter which it grants reserve to itself a right to regulate the interstate commerce business of a corporation, for it does not lie within the power of a State thus by its own act to obtain an authority over matters vested exclusively in the Federal Government.30

27 15 Wall. 284; 21 L. ed. 164.

28 See the dissenting opinion of Justice Miller in State Tax on Railway Gross Receipts.

29 Railroad v. Maryland, 21 Wall. 456; 22 L. ed. 678. Cf. Prentice and Egan, Commerce Clause, p. 299, and authorities there cited.

30 Louisville R. R. Co. v. Railroad Com. of Tenn., 19 Fed. Rep. 679.