Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/167/673/
Timestamp: 2019-04-19 00:54:30+00:00

Document:
Justia › US Law › US Case Law › US Supreme Court › Volume 167 › Hedrick v. Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe R. Co.
F. located a bounty land warrant on the west half of range 14, with which he was acquainted. The land office, knowing his purpose and intending to comply with it, by mistake and oversight entered the location as of the half of range 17 instead of range 14. F., being ignorant of the mistake, entered upon the half of range 14 which he had thus located, took possession of it, paid taxes on it, and sold it. His grantees and their successors paid taxes on it, occupied it, and exercised acts of ownership over it. H., by his agent W., who knew all these facts, applied to enter the tract in range 14 so intended to be located by F. and received a patent therefor. In an action instituted by H. to recover possession of a portion of the land, held that the plaintiff was not entitled to recover, and that he held the legal title, evidenced by his patent, as trustee for those holding under F.
"Now at this day, this cause coming on to be heard, the parties appear, by their respective attorneys, and answer, 'ready for trial;' and, a jury being waived, the cause is submitted to the court."
"And the court, having seen and heard the allegations and proofs of the parties, and being fully informed in the premises, doth find that this is an action of ejectment for the premises described in plaintiff's petition, brought by the plaintiff against the defendant the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad Company, and that the defendants Wilson and Sanders have on their own motion been made parties defendant. That the said defendant railroad company is the lessee of the Chicago, Santa Fe and California Railway Company of Iowa, which company is the grantee of the defendants Wilson and Sanders by general warranty deeds for the land in controversy. That the defendant Sanders is the grantee of said Wilson for a part of the said premises. That said Wilson is the grantee, by mesne conveyances of warranty, of one William E. Parcells, who is the grantee of one William A. Lane by general warranty deed of date April 15, 1875. That said Lane is the grantee of one Cavil M. Freeman by general warranty deed of date the _____ day of January, 1860."
14 west of the fifth principal meridian (which includes the land in question), and thereupon received a certificate of entry for said west half from the register of said land office, which entry was duly and properly posted on the books and records of said land office by proper notations and entries in the tract books, the plat book, and the monthly abstract book, but by mistake and oversight, said land was described in the application as being in range 17 instead of range 14."
"That said Freeman sold said land as aforesaid, and paid taxes thereon, and his grantees have ever since paid taxes thereon, and exercised acts of ownership over said land, and since April, 1875, have been in the actual, constant, continuous, and uninterrupted occupancy of said premises; making lasting and valuable and permanent improvements thereon, such as fencing, dwellings, and barns, and building a railroad thereon. That the plat book in the office of the County Clerk of Adair County, certified by the register of the land office in 1866, shows that said west half in range 14 had been entered and located by said Freeman, and the books in said land office continued to show said entry of said Freeman until some time subsequent to 1874, when first alterations and additions began to be made. And the court finds that said Freeman intended to and did enter said west half in range 14, and the land officers in the land office at Milan, Missouri, knew said intention of said Freeman, and that he intended to enter said tract, and they intended him to enter said tract, and that thereby he became and was vested and possessed of the equitable right and estate in and to said tract, and became and was entitled to a patent to said land from the government."
and did thereafter, on the 20th day of July, 1886, secure a patent for said land."
"And the court further finds that the plaintiff is not a purchaser of said land in good faith, without notice of the defendants' estate therein, but he is chargeable with full knowledge of all the rights, equities, and estate of defendants in and to the said premises, and holds the legal title, evidenced by said patent, as trustee for the defendant railroad company's lessor, the Chicago, Santa Fe and California Railway Company, and that plaintiff is not entitled to recover in this action."
as fully and completely as plaintiff might or could do so by regular warranty deed, duly executed according to law."
The plaintiff appealed to the Supreme Court of the State of Missouri, and, upon the affirmance by that court of the said decree, he sued out a writ of error from this Court.
This was an action of ejectment brought and tried in the Circuit Court of Adair County, Missouri. At the trial, a jury was waived, and the court made a finding of facts, and thereupon entered judgment in favor of the defendants. Upon a writ of error to the Supreme Court of Missouri, the findings by the circuit court were received as conclusive upon all the facts in issue, although, indeed, as we learn from its opinion, that court reviewed all the evidence, reaching the same conclusions with those found by the circuit court. 120 Mo. 516.
The findings of fact by the trial court and by the supreme court of the state are, in this writ of error, conclusive upon us. Republican River Bridge Co. v. Kansas Pac. Railroad, 92 U. S. 315; Dower v. Richards, 151 U. S. 658, 151 U. S. 672; Egan v. Hart, 165 U. S. 193.
Our only inquiry, therefore, is whether, upon the facts so found, the defendants in the court below were entitled to the judgment therein rendered.
land, and did thereafter, on the 20th day of July, 1886, receive a patent for said land; that the plaintiff was not a purchaser of said land in good faith, without notice of the defendants' estate therein, but was chargeable with full knowledge of all the rights, equities, and estate of defendants in and to the said premises.
The legal conclusion reached by the state courts upon such a state of facts was that the plaintiff was not entitled to recover, and that he held the legal title evidenced by said patent as trustee for the defendants. The propriety of that conclusion can be manifested by the citation of a few decisions of this Court.
"The rule is well settled by a long course of decisions that when public lands have been surveyed and placed in the market or otherwise opened to private acquisition, a person who complies with all the requisites necessary to entitle him to a patent in a particular lot or tract is to be regarded as the equitable owner thereof, and the land is no longer open to location. The public faith has become pledged to him, and any subsequent grant of the same land to another party is void unless the first location of entry be vacated and set aside."
his, they were enforceable against him even though he had secured a patent vesting the legal title in himself. Under such circumstances, a court of chancery can charge him as trustee, and compel a conveyance which shall convert the superior equity into a paramount legal title. The holder of a legal title in bad faith must always yield to a superior equity. As against the United States, his title may be good, but not as against one who had acquired a prior right from the United States in force when his purchase was made under which his patent issued. The patent vested him with the legal title, but it did not determine the equitable relations between him and third persons. Townsend v. Greely, 5 Wall. 326; Johnson v. Townley, 13 Wall. 72; Worth v. Branson, 98 U. S. 118; Marquez v. Frisbie, 101 U. S. 473."

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