In Gelpcke v. City of Dubuque (1863) 68 U.S. 175, was an action to recover the amount due on coupons or interest warrants originally attached to certain bonds issued by the City of Dubuque. A considerable stress was laid upon the inviolability of contracts. It was said in substance that the true and correct rule is that if the contract when made was valid under the laws then in effect, its validity and obligation cannot be impaired by subsequent action of the legislature, or by decisions of the courts. The Supreme Court refused to follow the ruling of the Supreme Court of Iowa that the State's constitution made invalid the municipal bonds there in suit, because, when the bonds issued, the Iowa court had made a contrary ruling. In thus departing from the ordinary rule, even then in effect, that a State's construction of its own constitution would be binding upon a federal court, Mr. Justice Swayne was moved to say, for the court: "We shall never immolate truth, justice, and the law, because a state tribunal has erected the altar and decreed the sacrifice." The Supreme Court allowed interest on municipal bond coupons. However, the Court, in allowing what was in effect interest upon interest, based its decision on the ground that the bonds and coupons in question had all the qualities of commercial paper, and stated as follows: "Bonds and coupons, like these, by universal commercial usage and consent, have all the qualities of commercial paper. If the Plaintiffs recover in this case, they will be entitled to the amount specified in the coupons, with interest and exchange as claimed." The court said: "When a corporation has power, under any circumstances, to issue negotiable securities, the bona fide holder has a right to presume they were issued under the circumstances which give the requisite authority, and they are no more liable to be impeached for any infirmity in the hands of such a holder than any other commercial paper." (The rule in Gelpckev. Dubuque gives no help when the contract or grant in question has not been made on the faith of a previous declaration of law.)