In Mullan v. United States (1890), the U.S Supreme Court dealt with a dispute over mining rights in Idaho. John Mullan had been granted a patent for his mining claim by the federal government, but later it was discovered that there were errors in the survey of his land which resulted in overlapping claims with other miners. The lower court ruled against Mullan and he appealed to the Supreme Court arguing that since he had already received a patent from the government, any subsequent disputes should be resolved in his favor. However, Justice Samuel Blatchford delivered an unanimous opinion rejecting this argument stating that even though patents are presumed to be valid, they can still be challenged if there is evidence of fraud or mistake involved during their issuance process. Therefore, despite having obtained a patent for his claim earlier on, Mullan's right over disputed lands could still be questioned due to mistakes made during its surveying process.

In the dissenting opinion for Mullan v. United States, it was argued that the majority's decision to uphold a conviction based on an 1865 law prohibiting unauthorized building of military fortifications was incorrect. The dissenting justices believed that this law did not apply to Mullan's actions because he had not built any actual military defenses but rather simple structures intended for civilian use. They contended that applying such a broad interpretation of the term "military fortification" would potentially criminalize many innocent activities and infringe upon individual rights and freedoms. Furthermore, they disagreed with the majority's assertion that Congress had implicitly authorized prosecution under this statute by failing to repeal it after its original purpose became obsolete following the end of Civil War hostilities in 1865.