Source: s3://data.kl3m.ai/documents/govinfo/USCOURTS/USCOURTS-ca8-02-02075/USCOURTS-ca8-02-02075-0/pdf.json

Nature of Suit Code: 290
Nature of Suit: Other Real Property Actions
Cause of Action: 

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United States Court of Appeals

FOR THE EIGHTH CIRCUIT

___________

No. 02-2075

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Marvin J. Bockelman; Kathleen M. *

Bockelman; W. Milton Von Holten, *

Co-trustee of the Von Holten Family *

Trust; Jeanette I. Von Holten, Co- *

trustee of the Von Holten Family Trust, * Appeal from the United States 

* District Court for the

Plaintiffs/Appellants, * Western District of Missouri.

*

v. *

*

MCI Worldcom, Inc., *

*

Defendant, *

*

Union Pacific Railroad Company, *

*

Defendant/Appellee. *

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Submitted: February 14, 2005

Filed: April 6, 2005 

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Before WOLLMAN, McMILLIAN, and BENTON, Circuit Judges.

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WOLLMAN, Circuit Judge.

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The Honorable Howard F. Sachs, United States District Judge for the Western

District of Missouri.

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Appellants Marvin and Kathleen Bockelman and W. Milton and Jeannette Von

Holten (Landowners) appeal from the district court’s1

 grant of summary judgment

against them. We affirm.

I.

On July 26, 1902, the St. Louis, Kansas City and Colorado Railroad Company

(St. Louis Railroad) acquired by warranty deed a strip of land from Jacob and Anna

Von Holten. The deed read, in pertinent part:

WITNESSETH, That the said parties of the first part [(the Von

Holtens)], for and in consideration of Three Hundred and Fifty

DOLLARS, to them paid by the said party of the second part [(the St.

Louis Railroad)], the receipt of which is hereby acknowledged, do by

these presents grant, bargain and sell, convey and confirm, unto the said

party of the second part...[a] strip of land one hundred (100) feet wide,

having a uniform width of fifty (50) feet on each side of the center line

of the railroad of said Company, as the same is now located across the

tracts of land described as follows...TO HAVE AND TO HOLD the

same together with all the rights, immunities, privileges and

appurtenances, the same belonging unto the said party of the second part

and its successors and assigns forever, the said parties of the first [part]

hereby covenanting that they and their heirs, executors, and

administrators shall and will WARRANT AND DEFEND the title to the

premises unto the said party of the second part, and unto its successors

and assigns FOREVER against the lawful claims of all persons

whomsoever.

The strip of land conveyed by the deed was made part of the St. Louis Railroad

as it then ran through the state of Missouri. The St. Louis Railroad was succeeded

by the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific Railroad Company (Rock Island Railroad).

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Although Union Pacific and its predecessors apparently had ceased in the

interim to use the strip of land for the carriage of railroad traffic, Union Pacific

contends that it had not ceased to use the strip for railroad purposes. Because we

conclude that the deed conveyed to the St. Louis Railroad a fee simple interest in the

strip of land, however, we need not further address the issue.

3

Qwest Communications Corporation was also named in the state action, but

was later dismissed.

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The Rock Island Railroad was later succeeded by the St. Louis Southwestern Railroad

Company. 

Approximately ninety years after the original 1902 deed, appellee MCI

Worldcom Network Services, Inc. (MCI), leased from the Southern Pacific

Telecommunications Company (as grantee of the St. Louis Southwestern Railroad

Company) the rights to install fiber optic cable underneath the strip of land and to

construct an above-ground fiber optic regeneration station on the strip of land.2

Appellee Union Pacific Railroad Company subsequently succeeded to the rights of

both the Southern Pacific Telecommunications Company and the St. Louis

Southwestern Railroad Company under the lease.

The Landowners, two married couples who each own a tract of land adjoining

the disputed strip, brought a declaratory judgment action in Missouri state court

against Union Pacific and MCI on May 5, 2000,3

 seeking a declaration that Union

Pacific and MCI did not possess the right to use the strip of land for fiber optic

network purposes. They claimed that the original deed from Jacob and Anna Von

Holten to the St. Louis Railroad conveyed a mere easement for railroad purposes and,

accordingly, asserted their right as adjoining landowners to enforce the terms of the

alleged easement. See Brown v. Weare, 152 S.W.2d 649, 655 (Mo. 1941) (when a

railroad acquires an easement, fee to the land over which the easement runs resides

in adjacent landowners). Union Pacific and MCI removed the suit to the United

States District Court for the Western District of Missouri on the basis of diversity of

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citizenship, and the Landowners were permitted to add claims for injunctive relief and

damages. After cross-motions for summary judgment, the district court granted

summary judgment against the Landowners and in favor of Union Pacific and MCI,

holding that the deed between Jacob and Anna Von Holten and the St. Louis Railroad

conveyed a fee simple interest in the disputed strip of land.

II.

We review a grant of summary judgment de novo and apply the same standards

as the district court. Hossaini v. W. Mo. Med. Ctr., 140 F.3d 1140, 1142 (8th Cir.

1998). Summary judgment is warranted if the evidence, viewed in the light most

favorable to the nonmoving party, shows that no genuine issue of material fact exists

and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. Id. 

Missouri law controls our analysis in this diversity case, and thus we review

the district court’s interpretation of Missouri law de novo. Bass v. Gen. Motors

Corp., 150 F.3d 842, 846-47 (8th Cir. 1998). In addition, we are bound by the

decisions of the Missouri Supreme Court regarding issues of substantive state law.

Id. at 847. If the Missouri Supreme Court has not yet addressed a particular issue,

“we may consider relevant state precedent, analogous decisions, considered dicta,

...and any other reliable data.” Id. (citations and quotations omitted). Decisions from

Missouri’s intermediate appellate court (the Missouri Court of Appeals) are

“particularly relevant,” and must be followed when they are the best evidence of

Missouri law. Knouse v. Gen. American Life Ins. Co. (In re Gen. American Life Ins.

Co. Sales Practices Litig.), 391 F.3d 907, 911-12 (8th Cir. 2004).

III.

The Landowners contend that the July 26, 1902, deed from Jacob and Anna

Von Holten to the St. Louis Railroad conveyed a mere easement for railroad purposes

rather than a fee simple interest. We disagree. In Missouri, railroads may hold,

purchase, or convey a fee in land when the land in question is conveyed for a valuable

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consideration and when the deed contains no restrictions on the quantum of the title

conveyed. Schuermann Enters., Inc. v. St. Louis County, 436 S.W.2d 666, 668 (Mo.

1969). 

If the land is conveyed without valuable consideration, the conveyance is a

“voluntary grant,” and the interest conveyed is merely an easement. Brown, 152

S.W.2d at 652-53. To be termed a valuable consideration, and thus avoid

classification as a voluntary grant, the consideration given under a deed must be

substantial, as opposed to merely nominal. Id. at 654. As consideration for the strip

of land at issue, the St. Louis Railroad gave $350, which is equivalent to

approximately $7,400 in 2003 dollars. We have no doubt that such an amount

constitutes substantial, and thus valuable, consideration, and the Landowners make

no serious argument that it does not. Instead, the Landowners contend that, even

assuming that the disputed strip of land was exchanged for a valuable consideration,

the quantum of title conveyed to the St. Louis Railroad was restricted to an easement

for railroad purposes.

 

The quantum of title conveyed to a railroad may be restricted in two ways.

First, the deed may describe the parcel conveyed as a “right of way.” Id. at 652;

Moore v. Mo. Friends of the Wabash Trace Nature Trail, Inc., 991 S.W.2d 681, 685-

86 (Mo. Ct. App. 1999). Second, the deed may limit the use of the parcel to railroad

purposes. Brown, 152 S.W.2d at 652; Moore, 991 S.W.2d at 685-87. The presence

of either restriction indicates that the railroad takes only an easement, as opposed to

a fee simple, pursuant to the deed. Brown, 152 S.W.2d at 652.

Neither restriction is present in the deed at issue here. Rather than describing

the land in question as a “right of way,” the deed uses the term “strip of land” to

denote the parcel conveyed. The use of such language is indicative of the conveyance

of a fee simple absolute. Homan v. Hutchison, 817 S.W.2d 944, 949 (Mo. Ct. App.

1991). Furthermore, the deed does not limit the use of the strip of land conveyed to

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railroad purposes, or to any other purposes for that matter. It simply conveys the strip

of land to the St. Louis Railroad. Finally, the deed’s use of the phrase “TO HAVE

AND TO HOLD the same together with all the rights, immunities, privileges and

appurtenances,” as well as its use of the terms “grant, bargain and sell,” provides

further evidence that the grantors intended to convey a fee simple. See University

City v. Chicago, Rock Island & Pac. Ry. Co., 149 S.W.2d 321, 325 (Mo. 1941)

(“grant, bargain and sell”); Bayless v. Gonz, 684 S.W.2d 512, 513 (Mo. Ct. App.

1985) (“to have and to hold...”). 

The Landowners nevertheless contend that, pursuant to City of Columbia v.

Baurichter, 729 S.W.2d 475 (Mo. Ct. App. 1987), we are permitted to look to other

deeds executed soon after the July 26, 1902, deed in order to ascertain the grantors’

intent regarding the interest conveyed by that deed. We are permitted to do so,

however, only when the language in the deed is ambiguous. Id. at 479. The disputed

deed in Baurichter used both “strip of land,” which indicates the conveyance of a fee

simple absolute, and “road,” which usually indicates the conveyance of a right of way

only, to describe the parcel in question. Id. Because the language of the deed itself

conflicted, and was therefore ambiguous, the court looked to other deeds executed

shortly after the disputed deed in order to ascertain the grantor’s intent. Id.

The July 26, 1902, deed contains no such ambiguity. The granting clause of

the deed describes the parcel conveyed as a “strip of land,” and the deed uses no

alternative terms to identify the parcel. To the extent that the deed uses the term

“railroad” in the granting clause, that term is used to provide a physical description

of the centerline of the parcel conveyed and not to describe the parcel itself.

Accordingly, we need not look outside the bounds of the deed in order to determine

the grantor’s intent, which was to convey a fee simple interest. Because Union

Pacific possesses a fee simple interest in the disputed strip of land, the Landowners

have no interest to enforce. See Nigro v. Ashley, 690 S.W.2d 410, 417 (Mo. Ct. App.

1985).

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Our holding that the deed conveyed a fee simple interest also disposes of the

Landowners’ argument that the St. Louis Railroad’s charter limits the quantum of

interest that the railroad could obtain in property acquired “for right of way.”

Because the strip of land at issue here was not, by the express or implied language of

the deed, limited to railroad right of way purposes, such an argument fails. To the

extent that the Landowners also contend that the terms of the charter operated as an

implied limitation on the type of interest that the St. Louis Railroad could obtain in

any property, we disagree. The charter stated that the railroad’s purpose was “to

construct, maintain and operate a standard gauge railroad, and in connection

therewith to construct, maintain and operate a line or lines of telegraph and a line or

lines of telephone” running through various points in Kansas and Missouri. Such

language does not, however, restrict the type of interest that the St. Louis Railroad

could obtain in order to effectuate those purposes. Therefore, although the manner

in which the St. Louis Railroad chose to acquire the strip of land in question may

have been unorthodox, the railroad’s charter did not bar it from doing so. 

The judgment is affirmed.

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