Case Title: Rogers v. United States

Citation: 

Docket Number: SC14-1465

State: florida

Court: Florida Supreme Court

Date: 2015-11-05T00:00:00Z

Document:
Supreme Court of Florida 
 
 
____________ 
 
No. SC14-1465 
____________ 
 
STEPHEN J. ROGERS, et al.,  
Appellants, 
 
vs. 
 
THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA,  
Appellee. 
 
[November 5, 2015] 
 
CANADY, J. 
 
Under the authority of article V, section 3(b)(6) of the Florida Constitution, 
the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit has certified to this 
Court a question of Florida law which the Court of Appeals found would be 
determinative of an appeal pending in that court and upon which that court found 
there to be “no controlling precedent in the existing decisions of the Florida 
Supreme Court.”  Rogers v. United States (Rogers III), Nos. 2013-5098 & 2013-
5102, slip op. at 4 (Fed. Cir. July 21, 2014).  We are authorized to answer the 
question.  See art. V, § 3(b)(6), Fla. Const. 
 
 
 
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FACTS 
This case originates from claims for compensation for takings of property 
filed in the United States Court of Federal Claims.  The claimants alleged that the 
conversion of a former railroad corridor into a recreational trail had effected a 
taking of the abutting landowners’ property rights without compensation.  The 
United States Court of Federal Claims, as explained in two opinions, each 
involving multiple claimants, found, insofar as the current appellants are 
concerned, that the claimants did not own any property interests in the land 
formerly used as a railroad corridor and therefore were not entitled to 
compensation.  See Rogers v. United States (Rogers II), 107 Fed. Cl. 387 (Fed. Cl. 
2012); Rogers v. United States (Rogers I), 93 Fed. Cl. 607 (Fed. Cl. 2010).  The 
claimants appealed these two decisions, and as stated above, the Court of Appeals 
for the Federal Circuit certified a question of Florida law for this Court to answer. 
 
The Court of Appeals set forth the following under the heading “A 
Statement of All Facts Relevant to the Questions Certified”: 
 
The property at issue involves, in part, a 12.43 mile long, 100 
foot wide strip of land between Sarasota and Venice in Sarasota 
County, Florida.  The Seaboard Air Line Railway (“Seaboard”) 
received property interests for the land underlying its railway through 
a series of transactions from 1910 through 1941.  In the early 1900s, 
Seaboard surveyed the property it intended to use for its rail way.  In a 
series of four deeds (the Blackburn, Phillips, Frazer, and Knight 
deeds), property owners conveyed their interests in the northern 
corridor of the rail way to Seaboard in September 1910.  Those deeds 
appear, on their face, to unambiguously convey a fee simple interest 
 
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to Seaboard.  After receiving these deeds, Seaboard laid track and 
began to operate trains along the entire corridor as of November 1911.  
At this time, Seaboard had not received any deed corresponding to the 
southern portion of the rail corridor, but still operated trains along the 
entire corridor. 
 
 
In 1926-27, Seaboard relocated the southern portion of its rail 
corridor a quarter mile to the east.  On April 1, 1927, trains began to 
run along the relocated rail corridor.  Then, on April 4, 1927, 
Seaboard received a deed from the Brotherhood of Locomotive 
Engineers pension fund (“BLE”) that appears, on its face, to 
unambiguously convey a fee simple interest in the property 
corresponding to the relocated southern portion of the rail corridor.[n. 2]  
Seaboard continued to operate trains along the entirety of the rail 
corridor. 
 
[N. 2]  Seaboard also received a deed from Venice-
Nokomis Holding Corporation on November 10, 1941 
that purported to transfer the same property that BLE 
transferred to Seaboard in the 1927 BLE deed. 
 
 
In 2003, a successor operator of the rail corridor, Seminole 
Gulf, sought an exemption from continuing to operate the rail line.  
The Surface Transportation Board granted Seminole Gulf’s petition 
for an exemption, which allowed Seminole Gulf and Sarasota County 
the opportunity to negotiate a railbanking and interim trail use 
agreement.  Seminole Gulf and Sarasota County reached an 
agreement, and CSX Corporation (“CSX”), the owner of the rail 
corridor, quitclaimed its interest in the property to the Trust for Public 
Land.  CSX then removed its track, and the Trust converted the 
property into the Legacy Trail. 
 
 
In addition to these facts, attached hereto are the following 
documents from the parties’ Appendix on Appeal: 
 
1. Court of Federal Claims’s Partial Final Judgment,       
entered May 10, 2013 (A1); 
 
 
2. Court of Federal Claims’s Opinion and Order, entered 
June 28, 2010 (A2-22); 
 
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3. Court of Federal Claims’s Opinion and Order, entered 
September 25, 2012 (A23-42). 
 
Rogers III, slip op. at 5-7 (one footnote omitted).  The Court of Appeals stated the 
certified question as follows: 
Assuming that a deed, on its face, conveys a strip of land in fee 
simple from a private party to a railroad corporation in exchange for 
stated consideration, does Fla. Stat. § 2241 (1892) (recodified at Fla. 
Stat. § 4354 (1920); Fla. Stat. § 6316 (1927); Fla. Stat. § 360.01 
(1941)), state policy, or factual considerations—such as whether the 
railroad surveys property, or lays track and begins to operate trains 
prior to the conveyance of a deed—limit the railroad’s interest in the 
property, regardless of the language of the deed? [n. 1] 
 
[N. 1] While the Appellants dispute whether the deeds 
appear on their face to transfer a fee simple interest in the 
properties at issue, like the Court of Federal Claims 
before us, we conclude that they do. 
 
Rogers III, slip op. at 5.   
 
Considering the alternatives included in the Court of Appeals’ certified 
question, we see that there are actually three questions: (1) Does section 2241, 
Revised Statutes of Florida (1892), limit the railroad’s interest in the property, 
regardless of the language of the deeds?  (2) Does state policy limit the railroad’s 
interest in the property, regardless of the language of the deeds?  (3) Do factual 
considerations, such as whether the railroad surveys land or lays track and begins 
running trains before the conveyance of a deed, limit the railroad’s interest in the 
property, regardless of the language of the deeds?  Under the circumstances found 
 
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to exist by the Court of Federal Claims, we answer all three questions in the 
negative. 
The Court of Appeals’ mention of “a railbanking and interim trail use 
agreement,” Rogers III, slip op. at 6, refers to a step in the process for converting 
an unused railroad corridor into a recreational trail under federal law.  See 16 
U.S.C. § 1247(d) (2012).1  The national program of conversion of unused railroad 
corridors into recreational trails, which is intended in part to “preserve established 
railroad rights-of-way for future reactivation of rail service,” 16 U.S.C. § 1247(d), 
is a valid exercise of the authority of Congress to regulate interstate commerce.  
See Preseault v. I.C.C., 494 U.S. 1, 17-19 (1990).   
 
The present case arises from the claims of a group of owners of land 
abutting the railroad corridor who claim that conveyances to the railroad by their 
predecessors in title granted only easements for a railroad right-of-way and did not 
convey fee simple title; that the abandonment of the railroad right-of-way gave 
them the right to claim the land free of the easements; and that the conversion of 
                                          
 
 
1.  National Trails System Act Amendments of 1983, Pub. L. No. 98-11, tit. 
II, § 208, 97 Stat. 42, 48.  There is no need for us to explain the difference between 
an “exemption from continuing to operate the rail line,” Rogers III, slip op. at 6, 
which the Court of Appeals stated was involved in this case, and an 
“abandonment” of a railroad corridor under 49 U.S.C. §§ 10502, 10903 (2012).  
See Whispell Foreign Cars, Inc. v. United States, 100 Fed. Cl. 529, 532-35 (Fed. 
Cl. 2011).  
 
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the land to a public recreational trail constitutes a taking for which they are entitled 
to compensation.  “[A] Fifth Amendment taking occurs when, pursuant to the 
Trails Act, state law reversionary interests are effectively eliminated in connection 
with a conversion of a railroad right-of-way to trail use.”  Caldwell v. United 
States, 391 F.3d 1226, 1228 (Fed. Cir. 2004); see also Hash v. United States, 403 
F.3d 1308 (Fed. Cir. 2005).  In the two opinions pending on review in the Court of 
Appeals, the Court of Federal Claims engaged in a detailed examination and 
analysis of the process and the legal documents by which Seaboard obtained title to 
the parcels of land in question in this proceeding.  
 
Seaboard obtained title to the parcels of land in question by five deeds, four 
executed in 1910 and one in 1927.  A sixth deed, recorded in 1941, conveyed the 
same property as the 1927 deed and appears to have been recorded to remove any 
doubt about the effect of the 1927 deed.  In the later of the Court of Federal 
Claims’ two opinions, the four 1910 deeds are referred to as the Blackburn, 
Phillips, Frazer, and Knight deeds.  See Rogers II, 107 Fed. Cl. at 389, 395-98.  
The 1927 deed was executed by the B.L.E. Realty Corporation and is referred to as 
the B.L.E. deed in the earlier Court of Federal Claims opinion.  See Rogers I, 93 
Fed. Cl. at 615. 
 
Record documents show that the Blackburn deed reads in pertinent part as 
follows: 
 
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That for and in consideration of the sum of Two Hundred Dollars 
($200.00) in hand paid, the receipt of which is hereby acknowledged, 
and other valuable consideration, the parties of the first part hereby 
grant, bargain, sell, and convey unto the party of the second part all 
their right, title and interest, of any nature whatsoever, in and to the 
following property, to-wit:  
 
[100-foot-wide strip of land, 50 feet on either side of a center line 
described by reference to township, range, and section lines, and 
described as being about 3.5 acres] 
 
TOGETHER WITH all and singular the tenements, 
hereditaments, and appurtenances thereunto belonging or 
appertaining, and every right, title or interest, legal or equitable, of the 
said party of the first part in and to the same.  
 
The other three 1910 deeds used the same operative language, i.e., “grant, bargain, 
sell and convey” for specified consideration all “right, title and interest of any 
nature whatsoever” together with all “appurtenances thereunto belonging” and, 
again, “every right, title or interest, legal or equitable.”   
 
The B.L.E. deed from 1927 reads in pertinent part: 
That said B.L.E. Realty Corporation, for and in consideration of the 
sum of Five Dollars, cash in hand paid, and for other good and 
valuable considerations, the receipt whereof is hereby acknowledged, 
hath granted, bargained, sold, aliened, remised and released and doth 
by these presents grant, bargain, sell, convey, alien, remise and 
release, unto the said Seaboard Air Line Railway Company, its 
successors and assigns, forever, all of its right, title and interest in and 
to the following real estate situated in Sarasota County, Florida, 
described as follows, to wit:  
 
[legal descriptions of three tracts of land] 
 
TO HAVE AND TO HOLD, together with the rights, members 
and appurtenances thereunto belonging or appertaining, unto the said 
 
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party of the second part, its successors and assigns in fee simple, 
forever. 
 
None of the deeds described the interest in land being conveyed as a “right of 
way.”  The Court of Federal Claims found that the deeds conveyed title to the 
parcels of land in question in fee simple.  Based on the finding that the claimants’ 
predecessors in title did not retain any ownership interests, the court held that the 
current owners of land abutting the corridor do not have any ownership interests 
and therefore have not suffered any compensable taking of property. 
ANALYSIS 
I.  The Statute 
 
At the time of the 1910 deeds, the statute cited by the Court of Appeals was 
codified as section 2803, General Statutes of Florida (1906).  At the time of the 
1927 deed, the same statute appeared as section 4354 in the Revised General 
Statutes of Florida (1920).2  In substance, this statute remained the same from the 
time of its adoption in 1874 until it was repealed in 1982 and will be referred to 
herein as Special Powers of Railroad Statute.  At all times relevant to the issues in 
this proceeding, the statute provided:   
                                          
 
 
2.  As noted by the Court of Appeals in its framing of the question, the 
statute also appeared as section 2241, Revised Statutes of Florida (1892), section 
6316, Compiled General Laws of Florida (1927), and section 360.01, Florida 
Statutes (1941).  Section 360.01 was repealed in 1982.  See ch. 81-318, § 2, Laws 
of Fla.   
 
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Every railroad and canal company shall be empowered: 
(1)  To cause such examinations and surveys for the proposed 
railroad or canal to be made as shall be necessary for the selection of 
the most advantageous route, and for such purposes by its officers, 
agents and servants to enter upon the lands or water of any person for 
that purpose. 
(2)  To take and hold such voluntary grants of real estate and 
other property as shall be made to it to aid in the construction, 
maintenance and accommodation of its road or canal, but the real 
estate received by voluntary grant shall be held and used for purposes 
of such grant only. 
(3)  To purchase, hold and use all such real estate and other 
property as may be necessary for the construction and maintenance of 
its road or canal and the stations and other accommodations necessary 
to accomplish the objects of its incorporation, and to sell, lease or buy 
any lands or real estate not necessary for its use.  
(4)  To lay out its road or canal, not exceeding two hundred feet 
in width, and to construct the same, and, for the purpose of cuttings 
and embankments and for obtaining gravel and other material, to take 
as much land as may be necessary for the proper construction, 
operation and security of the road or canal, or to cut down any trees 
that may be in danger of falling on the road or into the canal, making 
compensation therefor as provided for land taken for the use of the 
company. 
(5)  To construct its road or canal across, along or upon or use 
any stream of water, water-course, street, highway or canal which the 
route of its road or canal shall intersect or touch, and whenever the 
track of any railroad or canal shall touch, intersect or cross any road, 
highway or street, it may be carried over or under such railroad or 
canal, as may be found most expedient for the public good; and in 
case any embankment or cut in the construction of any railroad or 
canal shall make it necessary to change the course of any highway or 
street, the company may construct such road or canal so as to change 
the course or direction of any road, highway or street. 
(6)  To cross, intersect or unite its railroad with any other 
railroad heretofore or hereafter to be constructed at any point in its 
route or upon the ground of any other railroad company with the 
necessary turnouts, sidings and switches and other conveniences in 
furtherance of the objects of its connections; and every company 
whose railroad is or shall be hereafter intersected by any new railroad 
 
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can unite with the owners of such new railroads forming such 
intersections and connections and grant the facilities aforesaid, and if 
the two corporations cannot agree upon the amount of compensation 
to be made therefor and all the points and matters of such crossing and 
connections, the same shall be ascertained according to the provisions 
for exercising the right of eminent domain, and no company which 
shall have obtained the right of way and constructed its road at the 
point of intersection before the beginning of proceedings for 
condemnation shall be required to alter the grade or change the 
location of its road. 
(7)  To take and convey persons or property over their railroad 
or canal by the power or force of steam or animals or by any 
mechanical power, and to receive compensation therefor, and to do all 
the business incident to railroads or canal business. 
(8)  To erect and maintain all convenient buildings, wharves, 
docks, stations, fixtures and machinery for the accommodation and 
use of their passengers and freight business. 
(9)  To regulate the time and manner in which passengers and 
property shall be transported. 
(10)  To borrow such sums of money at such rates of interest 
and upon such terms as the company or its board of directors shall 
authorize or agree upon and may deem necessary or expedient, and to 
execute one or more trust deeds or mortgages, or both, as the occasion 
may require, of railroads or canals constructed or in process of 
construction by said company, for the amounts borrowed or owing by 
such company, as its board of directors shall deem expedient; and 
such company may make such provisions in such trust deed or 
mortgage for transferring their railroad track or canal right of way, 
depots, grounds, rights, privileges, franchises, immunities, machines, 
houses, rolling stock, furniture, tools, implements, appendages and 
appurtenances used in connection with such railroads or canals, in any 
manner whatsoever then belonging to the said company, or which 
shall thereafter belong to it, as security for any bonds, debts or sums 
of money as may be secured by such trust deed or mortgage, as they 
shall think proper; and in case of sale of any railroad or canal, or any 
part thereof, constructed or in course of construction by any railroad 
or canal company, by virtue of any trust deed or of any foreclosure of 
any mortgage thereon, the parties acquiring title under such, and their 
associates, successors or assigns, shall have or acquire thereby, and 
shall exercise and enjoy thereafter the same rights, privileges, grants, 
 
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franchises, immunities and advantages in or by said trust deed or 
mortgage enumerated and conveyed, which belonged to and were 
enjoyed by the company making such deed or mortgage or contracting 
such debt, so far as the same relate or appertain to that portion of said 
road or canal or the line thereof mentioned or described and conveyed 
by said mortgage or trust deed, and no further, as fully and absolutely 
in all respects as the corporators, officeholders, shareholders and 
agents of such company might or could have done, had not such sale 
or purchase taken place, and such purchasers, their associates, 
successors or assigns may become incorporated as provided by law. 
 
 
Appellants argue that subsection (2) of the statute applies, and since the 
statute provides that “real estate received by voluntary grant shall be held and used 
for the purposes of such grant only,” the interests conveyed to the railroad were 
only easements for use of the property as a railroad right of way.  However, 
nothing in any of the deeds indicates that any of them were voluntary grants or that 
they were intended to convey easements. 
 
A “voluntary conveyance” is “[a] conveyance made without valuable 
consideration.”  Black’s Law Dictionary 408 (10th ed. 2014).  Construing a similar 
state statute on the subject of railroad rights of way, the Supreme Court of Missouri 
has held that the term “voluntary grant” was used by the legislature to mean a 
conveyance without valuable consideration.  See, e.g., Clay v. Mo. State Highway 
Comm’n, 239 S.W.2d 505, 508 (Mo. 1951); Brown v. Weare, 152 S.W.2d 649, 
653 (Mo. 1941).  The provision in subsection (2) of the Florida statute, to the effect 
that “real estate received by voluntary grant shall be held and used for purposes of 
 
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such grant only,” does not apply in this case because the deeds were grants by 
bargain and sale for valuable consideration and conveyed fee simple title.3 
Appellants also argue that the intent to grant only easements is indicated by 
language in the deeds showing that the purpose for which the land was purchased 
was for a railroad right of way.  They cite cases from other jurisdictions holding 
that deeds granting property to railroads for rights of way are construed to convey 
easements rather than fee simple title.4  However, no decisions of Florida courts 
support Appellants’ argument.   
                                          
 
 
3.  “Voluntary grants” of land to railroads might include land grants made by 
a state or local government or the federal government.  Other grantors might 
donate land to railroads in the hope of benefiting from the location of the railroad 
tracks or a station.  See Seaboard Air Line Ry. Co. v. Bd. of Bond Trustees of 
Special Road & Bridge Dist., 108 So. 689, 698 (Fla. 1926); Armstrong v. Seaboard 
Air Line Ry. Co., 95 So. 506, 506-07 (Fla. 1922).  
4.  See Neider v. Shaw, 65 P.3d 525 (Idaho 2003) (use of term “right of 
way” in conveyance indicates an easement); Ross, Inc. v. Legler, 199 N.E.2d 346 
(Ind. 1964) (public policy construes conveyances to railroads for rights of way as 
easements); Harvest Queen Mill & Elev. Co. v. Sanders, 370 P.2d 419 (Kan. 1962) 
(railroads do not get fee simple title to rights of way); Ill. Cent. R.R. Co. v. 
Roberts, 928 S.W.2d 822 (Ky. 1996) (term “right of way” in deed to railroad 
conveys an easement); Mich. Dep’t of Nat. Res. v. Carmody-Lahti Real Estate, 
Inc., 699 N.W.2d 272 (Mich. 2005) (deed granting right of way conveys an 
easement); Brown v. Weare, 152 S.W.2d 649 (Mo. 1941) (public policy of state is 
that when railroad acquires right of way it takes an easement); Pollnow v. State 
Dep’t of Nat. Res., 276 N.W.2d 738 (Wis. 1979) (railroad right of way taken by 
condemnation is an easement). 
 
 
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The effect of a deed, both as to the property conveyed and the character of 
the estate conveyed, is determined by the intent of the grantor.  See Reid v. Barry, 
112 So. 846, 852 (Fla. 1927).  In Saltzman v. Ahern, 306 So. 2d 537, 539 (Fla. 1st 
DCA 1975), Florida’s First District Court of Appeal restated the following well-
established rule: 
When the language of a deed is clear and certain in meaning and the 
grantor’s intention is reflected by the language employed, there is no 
room for judicial construction of the language nor interpretation of the 
words used.  Rules of construction will be utilized only where the 
meaning or effect of the deed is doubtful.  If there is no ambiguity in 
the language employed then the intention of the grantor must be 
ascertained from that language.   
 
We need not discuss the language of the deeds in this case in detail or the 
circumstances of their execution because the Court of Federal Claims did a 
thorough job of it in reaching the conclusion that the deeds by their language 
appeared to convey fee simple title.  The deeds in question in this case included all 
the formal statements needed to show that the land was purchased and that the 
deeds granted fee simple title.5 
                                          
 
 
5.  Section 689.10, Florida Statutes (2014), provides: 
Where any real estate has heretofore been conveyed or granted 
or shall hereafter be conveyed or granted without there being used in 
the said deed or conveyance or grant any words of limitation, such as 
heirs or successors, or similar words, such conveyance or grant, 
whether heretofore made or hereafter made, shall be construed to vest 
the fee simple title or other whole estate or interest which the grantor 
had power to dispose of at that time in the real estate conveyed or 
 
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Contrary to Appellants’ argument, Florida law recognizes that railroads may 
hold fee simple title to land acquired for the purpose of building railroad tracks.  
See, e.g., Atlantic Coast Line R.R. Co. v. Duval Cnty., 154 So. 331 (Fla. 1934); 
Clark v. Cox, 85 So. 173 (Fla. 1920); Fla. Power Corp. v. McNeely, 125 So. 2d 
311 (Fla. 2d DCA 1960).  Subsection (3) of the statute authorized railroad 
companies to “purchase . . . such real estate  . . . as may be necessary to the 
construction and maintenance of its road.”  The fact that railroads in Florida have 
also conducted their operations using rights of way which they held by virtue of 
easements, see Van Ness v. Royal Phosphate Co., 53 So. 381 (Fla. 1910); Silver 
Springs, Ocala & Gulf R.R. v. Van Ness, 34 So. 884 (Fla. 1903), does not change 
this fact.  The determinative factor is the language of the deed when the language 
                                          
 
granted, unless a contrary intention shall appear in the deed, 
conveyance or grant. 
This law was enacted in 1903, ch. 5145, § 1, Laws of Fla. (1903), and made 
retroactive in 1925.  Ch. 10170, § 1, Laws of Fla. (1925).  One purpose of 
the law was to make it unnecessary to include certain language required 
under the common law to convey an “estate of inheritance.”  See Reid v. 
Barry, 112 So. 846, 860-61 (Fla. 1927).  In Reid, the Court observed that the 
“habendum clause” of a deed defines the estate to be conveyed.  “But if the 
estate conveyed is shown by the granting clause, the habendum is not 
necessary and its omission of no effect.”  Id. at 861.  The effect of this 
statute is that a deed is presumed to convey fee simple title, or whatever title 
the grantor had power to convey, unless a contrary intention is shown by the 
language of the deed. 
 
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is clear.  See, e.g., Cohen v. Pan Am. Aluminum Corp., 363 So. 2d 59 (Fla. 3d 
DCA 1978).   
 
On the first component of the certified question, we answer that nothing in 
section 2241, Revised Statutes of Florida (1892), as the statute existed then or 
later, limited the railroad’s interest in the property regardless of the language of the 
deed.       
II.  State Policy 
 
Appellants argue that the railroads that operated trains using the corridor in 
question in this case occupied and used the corridor under rights of way that were 
easements, that is, rights to use the strips of land for railroad purposes only.  
According to this argument, when the corridor stopped being used for railroad 
purposes and was in effect abandoned, unencumbered title to the land reverted to 
the abutting landowners as successors in title to the owners who granted the 
railroad the right to run trains over their property.6  Subsection (4) of the statute 
                                          
 
 
6.  Some courts have cautioned against using the term “reversion” to refer to 
the interest of an owner of land subject to an easement whose servient estate is 
later unburdened by reason of the abandonment or discontinuation of the easement.   
[A] “reversion” is a future interest remaining in the transferor 
following the conveyance of certain lesser estates to a transferee, 
typically when the transferee takes a possessory estate of freehold, for 
example a life estate.  An easement is not such a possessory estate of 
freehold. . . . Therefore labeling the retained interest a “reversion” is 
not consistent with the traditional classification scheme, which views 
 
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quoted above provides that a railroad company may “take as much land as may be 
necessary for the proper construction, operation, and security of the road . . . 
making compensation therefor.”  Appellants argue that, even if the deeds by which 
the landowners granted land to the railroad appeared to convey fee simple title, the 
various parcels of land making up the corridor used by the railroad should 
nevertheless be treated as though they were taken by eminent domain.      
 
Appellants cite cases from other jurisdictions holding that when a railroad 
obtains property by eminent domain for use as a railroad right of way, it receives 
only such interest as is needed to fulfill the purpose of the taking, which is an 
easement.  We need not address the nature, quality, or character of the title or 
estate in land a railroad obtains when it takes land for a right of way by eminent 
domain under Florida law, because the deeds in question in this case conveyed fee 
simple title and were obtained by bargain and sale, not eminent domain. 
 
Appellants argue that the deeds show that the railroad paid only nominal 
consideration for the land and that the recitation of nominal consideration in a deed 
                                          
 
the retained interest as a present estate in fee simple, subject to the 
burden of the easement.  
Preseault v. United States, 100 F.3d 1525, 1533 (Fed. Cir. 1996); see also 
Brown, 152 S.W.2d at 655 (Mo. 1941) (“[I]n the grant of an easement no 
title passes but . . . continues in the holder of the servient estate so that when 
the easement ceases there can be no such thing as a reversion of title. . . . 
[T]he servient estate is merely freed from the burden of the use . . . .”). 
 
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can be evidence that the grantor intended to grant something less than full title.  
Appellants suggest that the amounts of consideration stated in the deeds show that 
the deeds were meant to convey easements rather than fee simple title.  Appellants 
cite Craft v. Craft, 76 So. 772 (Fla. 1917), to support this argument.  In Craft, 
certain lots were conveyed without any consideration under circumstances where 
the grantee had agreed to sell the lots and remit the proceeds to the grantors.  The 
Court held that while the grantee received legal title, his undertaking created a trust 
enforceable in a court of equity.  Id. at 772-73.  The agreement of the parties 
resulted in the grantee holding the proceeds of the sales in trust for the grantors.  
The case is inapplicable here because the facts are distinguishable.  Appellants also 
cite Ogg v. Mediacom LLC, 142 S.W.3d 801 (Mo. Ct. App. 2004), where a 
Missouri court found nominal consideration to be a factor in discerning the 
grantor’s intent to convey an easement rather than fee simple title.  The law of 
Florida, however, is that the amount of consideration stated in a deed provides no 
basis for questioning the validity of the deed.  See, e.g., Kingsland v. Godbold, 456 
So. 2d 501 (Fla. 5th DCA 1984); Venice East, Inc. v. Manno, 186 So. 2d 71 (Fla. 
2d DCA 1966).  The language of the deed determines the nature of the estate 
conveyed.  Here the deeds were clear in their language and conveyed fee simple 
title. 
 
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Appellants argue that the deeds should be construed as having granted 
easements because the law of Florida disfavors recognition of fee simple title to 
“strips and gores” of land which become isolated due to changes in their use or 
other circumstances.  As applied to railroad rights of way, Appellants argue, this 
principle of law would operate so that upon abandonment of a railroad corridor, 
title would “revert” to the adjoining landowners.  To support this argument, 
Appellants cite cases dealing with street and road easements created by subdivision 
plats, such as Paine v. Consumers’ Forwarding & Storage Co., 71 F. 626 (6th Cir. 
1895), in which the court explained the principle as follows: 
The existence of “strips or gores” of land along the margin of 
nonnavigable lakes, to which the title may be held in abeyance for 
indefinite periods of time, is as great an evil as are “strips and gores” 
of land along highways or running streams.  The litigation that may 
arise therefrom after long years, or the happening of some unexpected 
event, is equally probable, and alike vexatious in each of the cases, 
and that public policy which would seek to prevent this by a 
construction that would carry the title to the center of a highway, 
running stream, or nonnavigable lake that may be made a boundary of 
the lands conveyed applies indifferently, and with equal force, to all 
of them. 
 
Id. at 629-30 (quoting Lembeck v. Nye, 24 N.E. 686, 689 (Ohio 1890)).  Paine 
involved a subdivision plat by which strips of land had been designated for use as 
streets.  Later one of the streets was abandoned, and the court held that the deeds to 
the lots adjacent to the land designated for a street had conveyed title that extended 
to the center line of the street.  It was clear that the court was applying a 
 
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presumption as to the grantor’s intent, which would not have been appropriate or 
necessary had a different intention been made clear in the deeds.  Id. at 629, 632, 
634-35.  As applied to a railroad right of way, the “strips and gores” doctrine has 
been explained as follows: 
The presumption is that a deed to a railroad or other right of way 
company (pipeline company, telephone company, etc.) conveys a 
right of way, that is, an easement, terminable when the acquirer’s use 
terminates, rather than a fee simple.  Transaction costs are minimized 
by undivided ownership of a parcel of land, and such ownership is 
facilitated by the automatic reuniting of divided land once the reason 
for the division has ceased.  If the railroad holds title in fee simple to a 
multitude of skinny strips of land now usable only by the owner of the 
surrounding or adjacent land, then before the strips can be put to their 
best use there must be expensive and time-consuming negotiation 
between the railroad and its neighbor—that or the gradual extinction 
of the railroad’s interest through the operation of adverse possession.  
It is cleaner if the railroad’s interest simply terminates upon the 
abandonment of railroad service.  A further consideration is that 
railroads and other right of way companies have eminent domain 
powers, and they should not be encouraged to use those powers to 
take more than they need of another person’s property—more, that is, 
than a right of way.  But all this said, there is nothing to prohibit a 
farmer or other landowner from selling outright to the railroad a strip 
of land for the railroad’s tracks; and if that is how the matter was 
handled with respect to some or all of the parcels in this case, Penn 
Central remains their owner today, save as its rights may have been 
extinguished by adverse possession. 
 
Penn Central Corp. v. U.S. R.R. Vest Corp., 955 F.2d 1158, 1160 (7th Cir. 1992) 
(citations omitted).  This explanation supports our conclusion that since the deeds 
in question here were clear as to the title conveyed, presumptions that are used 
when the intent is unclear do not apply. 
 
- 20 - 
 
Appellants also cite certain decisions of this Court in support of their “strips 
and gores” argument.  In Seaboard Air Line Ry. v. Southern Investment Co., 44 
So. 351 (Fla. 1907), and Florida Southern Ry. v. Brown, 1 So. 512 (Fla. 1887), this 
Court recognized that when a street or highway is the boundary of a lot or piece of 
land, the owner of the lot owns to the center of the street or highway, subject to the 
right of the public to use the public street or highway.  “The rule seems to be based 
on the supposed intention of the parties, and the improbability of the grantor 
desiring or intending to reserve his interest in the street when he had parted with 
his title to the adjoining land.”  Id. at 513-14.  In Smith v. Horn, 70 So. 435 (Fla. 
1915), a subdivision plat was mapped out showing blocks and lots with spaces for 
streets running in between them.  The plat showed the owner’s intent to create 
public easements for the streets.  The purchasers of the lots were presumed to have 
received title to the land extending to the center of the street abutting their lots. 
Upon the subsequent abandonment or surrender of a street easement, the abutting 
owners owned the property to the center of the street free of the easement.  Id. at 
436-37.  This outcome was based on the presumed intent of the grantor in the 
absence of a contrary showing.  Servando Bldg. Co. v. Zimmerman, 91 So. 2d 289 
(Fla. 1956), recognized that the rule applied in Horn, Southern Investment, and 
Brown is a rule of construction that is employed to aid in determining the grantor’s 
intent.  Under this body of caselaw, a conveyance of a lot bordered by a street is 
 
- 21 - 
presumed to carry title to the center of the street.  This rule of construction does not 
apply if a contrary intention is made clear by the language of the deed.  To the 
same effect is the decision in United States v. 16.33 Acres of Land, 342 So. 2d 476 
(Fla. 1977).  The presumption is also inapplicable if the strip of land being claimed 
is titled in someone else.  See Paine, 71 F. at 629.   
These cases on subdivision plats are distinguishable.  Moreover, the 
presumption that an owner of a lot abutting a street owns to the center of the street 
will not prevail over clear language in a deed showing contrary intent.7  The 
Appellants claim to be the successors in title of landowners whose land was subject 
to an easement for a railroad right of way.  But the Appellants in the present case 
cannot be equated to purchasers who took title to land subject to an easement for a 
street or road for the benefit of the public whose land was later unburdened due to 
the discontinuation or abandonment of the street or road easement.  The 
Appellants’ predecessors were the grantors, and if they intended to grant only 
easements their deeds would have said so.  The record shows that the claimants’ 
predecessors in title did not grant mere easements to the railroad while retaining 
title to the land underlying the easements.  It shows instead that the owners sold 
                                          
 
 
7.  We need not discuss whether or to what extent this “center line 
presumption” rule still applies to property adjacent to streets and highways in 
Florida today.  We hold that it has no application in this case. 
 
- 22 - 
their land to the railroad and conveyed to it fee simple title.  We therefore find that 
the decisions Appellants cite in support of their “strips and gores” argument are 
inapplicable to this case. 
We answer the second part of the question by holding that no policy of the 
State of Florida limits the railroad’s interest in the property regardless of the 
language of the deed.   
III.  Other Factual Considerations 
 
The third part of the certified question asks whether “factual 
considerations—such as whether a railroad surveys property, or lays track and 
begins to operate trains prior to the conveyance of a deed, limit the railroad’s 
interest in the property.”  Rogers III, slip op. at 5.  
 
Subsection (1) of the railroad and canal statute quoted above provided as 
follows: 
Every railroad and canal company shall be empowered: 
(1)  To cause such examinations and surveys for the proposed 
railroad or canal to be made as shall be necessary for the selection of 
the most advantageous route, and for such purposes by its officers, 
agents and servants to enter upon the lands or water of any person for 
that purpose. 
 
Thus the railroad company was authorized to enter upon private land for the 
purpose of conducting surveys to determine the best route for the railroad.   
 
- 23 - 
 
Appellants seek support in Preseault v. United States, 100 F.3d 1525 (Fed. 
Cir. 1996), for the argument that surveying the land and locating the corridor for 
the railroad gave the process of purchasing the rights of way an “eminent domain 
flavor.” Id. at 1537.  The suggestion, based on Preseault, is that the element of 
potential coercion from the possibility of condemnation should lead a court to 
conclude that the railroad’s resulting interest in the property is only an easement, 
assuming an easement is the most the railroad could have obtained by 
condemnation.  Preseault was grounded on the Court of Appeals’ conclusions 
about state law.  Id. at 1534.  However, where state law does not “treat, as 
conveying an easement, rather than a fee, a deed that conveyed all right, title and 
interest of the grantor,” the outcome will be different.  Burgess v. United States, 
109 Fed. Cl. 223, 233 (Fed. Cl. 2013) (citing Lowers v. United States, 663 N.W.2d 
408, 410 (Iowa 2003), for its refusal to “[d]etermin[e] the nature of the interest 
conveyed by reference to the intended use by the grantee.”). 
 
In Holland v. State, 388 So. 2d 1080 (Fla. 1st DCA 1980), a grantor sold 
land to the State for a negotiated price for a highway right of way, conveying fee 
simple title by warranty deed in statutory form.  The court held that the grantor 
could not later claim that the State did not obtain subsurface rights on the ground 
that there would have been no necessity for the State to obtain the subsurface rights 
in a taking by eminent domain.  “The time for appellants to have declined 
 
- 24 - 
voluntary relinquishment of subsurface mineral rights was when the fee simple sale 
was bargained and consummated, averting condemnation proceedings in which 
appellants might have challenged the public necessity for the taking.”  Id. at 1082.  
Similarly, the fact that a railroad endowed by the State with the power of eminent 
domain might not have been able to show a necessity of taking more than an 
easement does not provide a basis for questioning the effect of an unambiguous 
deed that was sufficient on its face to convey fee simple title.  We therefore 
conclude that the fact that the railroad company surveyed property that it did not 
own and located a route for its railroad before acquiring title to it did not affect the 
nature or quality of the property interest the railroad received under the deeds that 
were executed later.   
The record shows that the four deeds that conveyed property used for the 
northern part of the route were executed before the tracks were laid.  Thus the 
question about running trains before the conveyance is not involved.  The southern 
part of the route was relocated in the mid-1920s.  Trains were running on the 
southern part of the route at the time of the 1927 deed from B.L.E. Realty.  The 
opinion of the Court of Federal Claims explains the complicated history of the 
parcels of land conveyed to Seaboard by the 1927 B.L.E. Realty deed.  See 
Rogers I, 93 Fed. Cl. at 612-16.  There is no need for us to explain the events that 
led to the railroad operating on those tracks before it had secured title to the right 
 
- 25 - 
of way.  Appellants have not cited any source of statutory or decisional law 
applicable in Florida that supports their argument that a deed meeting all the 
formal requisites for passing fee simple title is rendered invalid or is limited in its 
effect by the fact that the grantee is already occupying the property.  When a deed 
is unambiguous and sufficient on its face to show the grantor’s intent as to the 
property described and the estate conveyed, extrinsic evidence is not admissible to 
vary the terms.  See, e.g., Fla. Moss Prods. Co. v. City of Leesburg, 112 So. 572 
(Fla. 1927); Mason v. Roser, 588 So. 2d 622 (Fla. 1st DCA 1991).   
  We answer the third part of the certified question by holding that the 
factual considerations referred to in the certified question do not limit the railroad’s 
interest in the property regardless of the language of the deeds. 
CONCLUSION 
The certified question is answered in the negative as explained above.  We 
submit our answer and remand the case to the United States Court of Appeals for 
the Federal Circuit. 
It is so ordered. 
LABARGA, C.J., and PARIENTE, LEWIS, QUINCE, POLSTON, and PERRY, 
JJ., concur. 
 
NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO FILE REHEARING MOTION, AND 
IF FILED, DETERMINED.   
 
 
- 26 - 
Certified Question of Law from the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal 
Circuit - Case Nos. 2013-5098 & 2013-5102 
 
Mark F. (Thor) Hearne, II of Arent Fox, LLP, Clayton, Missouri; Andrew Prince 
Brigham of Brigham Property Rights Law Firm, Jacksonville, Florida; Raoul G. 
Cantero, III and David P. Draigh of White & Case LLP, Miami, Florida; and James 
W. Ely, Jr., Professor Emeritus, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, Tennessee,  
 
 
for Appellants 
 
John C. Cruden, Assistant Attorney General, and Lane N. McFadden, Appellate 
Attorney, United States Department of Justice, Washington, District of Columbia; 
and Michael T. Gray, Appellate Attorney, United States Department of Justice, 
Jacksonville, Florida, 
 
 
for Appellee 
 
Major Best Harding, James Harold Thompson, and Robert Neil Clarke, Jr. of 
Ausley & McMullen, P.A., Tallahassee, Florida; and Kim Rice Bongiovanni, 
Assistant General Counsel, CSX Transportation, Inc., Jacksonville, Florida, 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae CSX Transportation, Inc. 
 
Robert W. Goldman of Goldman Felcoski & Stone, P.A., Naples, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae The Real Property, Probate & Trust Law Section of The 
Florida Bar 
 
Matthew Zane Leopold, General Counsel, Craig Deron Varn, General Counsel, 
Ronald Elliot D. Potter, Senior Assistant General Counsel, and Sarah Meyer Doar, 
Senior Assistant General Counsel, Florida Department of Environmental 
Protection, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
for Amicus Curiae Board of Trustees of the Internal Improvement Trust 
Fund 
 
Kenneth Bradley Bell, Amy Brigham Boulris, and Lauren Vickroy Purdy of 
Gunster Yoakley & Stewart, P.A., Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
 
- 27 - 
for Amici Curiae Alabama & Gulf Coast Railway, LLC, The Apalachicola 
Northern Railway, LLC, The Bay Line Railroad, LLC, The First Coast 
Railroad, Inc., The Florida Central Railroad Company, Inc., Florida East 
Coast Railway, LLC, The Florida Midland Railroad Company, Inc., The 
Florida Northern Railroad Company, Inc., Georgia Southern and Florida 
Railway Company, Seminole Gulf Railway, LP, and The Talleyrand 
Terminal Railroad Company, Inc. 
 
Alexandra Jennifer Overhoff, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae Florida Land Title Association 
 
Marc Allen Peoples, Assistant General Counsel, Florida Department of 
Transportation, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae Florida Department of Transportation 
 
Pamela Jo Bondi, Attorney General, Allen C. Winsor, Solicitor General, and 
Rachel Erin Nordby, Deputy Solicitor General, Tallahassee, Florida, 
 
 
for Amicus Curiae State of Florida