The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1895-08-14
THE SAN MIGUEL RANCHO.
Landowners Laugh at the
TWenty-Four Million Dol
lar Suit.
SPANISH LAWS ARE QUOTED
Many of the Land Companies and
Private Owners Have Govern
ment Patents.

The pending suit of the Noe heirs
against the property-owners in that part
OF the city known as the San Miguel
Rancho, an account of which was pub.
lished exclusively in THE CALL yesterday
morning, created an interest among the
dwellers of the district in proportion to
the enormity of the land values involved.
Careful and conservative estimates do
not decrease the probable amount of the
property values as first given-$24, 000, COO
and some place it even higher. In all
such suits there is a disposition to con-
slider the action in the manner of "bluff"
Tor Interior purposes, but in this instance
the long residence and social standing of
the plaintiffs in this City is calculated to
render any such deduction or surmise in
appropriate.
The Noe heirs have employed prominent
and responsible Mexican counsel, in con-
nection with Messrs. Gum e. Koscial-
owski, to prosecute thorough research
into the fundamental Spanish laws in ope-
ration at the time the Governor of Alta Cali
fornla made the grant of one square league
OF land to Jose de Jesus Noe. All the early
land transactions were made under these
laws, and the operation thereof has fur
nlshed the basis OF innumerable suits to
satisfy title since the State was admitted
to the Union.
The attorneys for the plaintiffs call at
tention to the fact that the California
courts have been at varience in their inter
probation of the Spanish laws for years
past, and that no ultimatum has ever been
established. This may also furnish an ex-
PLANTATION of the Discrimination of other at
l-nlx 10 ha ,,,{a e@a1 ~, 4Aah
suit on behalf of the 1000 or more de-
PENDANTS to express an opinion concerning
the extent to which land grant transac-
tons are amenable to the Spanish law.
Whatever the cause, those who were asked
for an opinion yesterday declined to ex-
press themselves on the ground that they
had not had time to look up the law.
Mr.. Koscialowski said:
There is nothing but law in the suit, and the
heirs are too well known to permit of the
slightest suspicion of money extortion
scheme. The courts of California have held
almost universally in their construction Of the
Mexican law that all land grants made prior to
the admission of California into the Union
should be classified "bienes gananciales"
(donations) made by the Government. In the
case of Panaud VS.. Jones, First Cal. 44S, the
court, after reviewing the case at considerable
length, decided that the property received by
Alvlso by way of grant was gananciales
(gains), and asserts that Alviso had entire con-
ciales. Mrs. Alviso died before her husband,
but the court held that no estate vested in the
children, and that 1T was common property on
the decease of their mother, and that their
title interest only became perfect after the
death of their father, and only then after the
debts had been paid. Now, by Escriehe's
Spanish lawbook) definition of gananciales,
it is shown that property received
by the grantee as reward for
military services was his separate property,
for at the time he was performing these ser
vices he received a salary and support from the
Government But if, at the time of perform
ing these services, he was paying his own eX-
penses, living on the income derived from the
grant should be gananciales. Alviso received
this grant in return for military services, and
it is not known whether he lived upon the
salary received from the Government during
the performance of these services, or whether
he paid his own expenses out of the gains and
profits. / call attention to this for the
reason that Escriche says that the wife had
tacit mortgage on the separate property of
the husband TO compel said husband to make
good to her or her heirs the dotal property he
might have received either before or after
marriage. Now, this grant received by Alviso
for military services may have been his sep
arate property, in which case his heirs would
have claim upon it, but not through their
mothers mortgage upon the same as described
above.
Many of those connected with the land
and improvement companies operating in
the district have Government patent titles
to the land and laugh at the idea of such q
preposterous claim being set up at this