Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/208/234/
Timestamp: 2019-04-22 08:49:17+00:00

Document:
Where a judge of the highest court of a state, in allowing a writ of error, adds to his signature "Presiding Judge, etc., in the absence of the chief judge from the state," that recital is prima facie evidence that the chief judge is absent and the judge signing is presiding, and, if not controverted, the writ of error is properly allowed and the requirement of § 999, Rev.Stat., that it must be allowed either by the Chief Justice of the state court or a justice of this Court is complied with.
The contention in the state court that plaintiff in error's title rested on a patent to his grantor and that, prior to the issuing thereof, the legal title had remained in the United States, so that adverse possession could not be obtained, involves a federal question, and as in this case it was not frivolous, and was necessarily decided by the state court, and such decision was adverse to the title set up under the United States, this Court has jurisdiction under § 709, Rev.Stat., to review the judgment.
The rulings of this Court that the Union Pacific Railroad main line grant, within place limits, made by the Act of July 1, 1862, 12 Stat. 489, and the amendatory Act of July 2, 1864, 13 Stat. 356, was in praesenti, and that, after definite location of its road, the grantee company could maintain ejectment and that title could be acquired against it by adverse possession, held in this case to apply to lands embraced within the grant for construction of the Sioux City branch road, notwithstanding such branch was to be constructed by a company to be thereafter incorporated.
Where lands are within the overlap of place limits of two grants, both of which are in praesenti, and for which eventually a joint patent is issued to both companies, the occupancy of a portion thereof, under a deed given by one of the companies after definite location, and before the issuing of the joint patent, is adverse to the other company, and not that of a co-tenant; nor, under the circumstances of this case, do the acts of such occupant in acquiring title from the United States, under the remedial Act of March 3, 1887, 24 Stat. 556, interfere with his title thereto which had already been established by adverse possession.
Within the grants of land made to the Union Pacific Railroad Company and the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company by the Act of Congress of July 1, 1862, 12 Stat. 489, c. 120, and the amendatory Act of July 2, 1864, 13 Stat. 356, c. 216, some of the land within place limits overlapped. This controversy concerns the title to a forty-acre tract within an overlap.
the proofs in order to make clear the contentions which are required to be decided.
the same, until February 28, 1891, when he sold it to Asmus Wiese, the defendant in error. The latter at once recorded his deed, enclosed the land with a wire fence, and maintained an exclusive possession of the land, claiming to be the owner.
Upon the ground that the school indemnity selection referred to, although invalid, was uncancelled when the railroad grants of 1862 and 1864 were made, and that such invalid selection operated to except the tract in question from said grants, the General Land Office on May 19, 1892, cancelled the listing of the tract which had been made by the Union Pacific Railroad Company and rejected a claim "as to this land" made by the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company. When such claim was made and its precise character is not shown by the record.
Railroad Company and to the Missouri Valley Land Company, successor in interest of the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company, jointly.
Prior, however, to the issue of the patent last referred to, and on November 12, 1902, Wiese commenced, in the District Court of Washington County, Nebraska, this action to quiet his title to the tract, making defendants to the petition the Union Pacific Railway Company, the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company, and the Missouri Valley Land Company. On February 7, 1903, the Union Pacific Railway Company filed a disclaimer of "any and all interest of every kind or nature in and to the subject matter of this action." The issues, however, upon which the case was tried were made by a second amended petition, filed on February 20, 1904, and an answer and cross-petition thereto and a reply to the cross-petition. The only defendants named in this second amended petition were the Missouri Valley Land Company and the Iowa Railroad Land Company. Averments were made in the petition as to the making of the overlapping grants by Congress, the completion of the two railroads prior to January 1, 1870, the sale to Japp in 1882 and by Japp to the plaintiff, the adverse possession of the land by the plaintiff and his grantor, commencing in 1882, absolute ownership of the land by the plaintiff, the issue in 1903 of the joint patent for the land to the successors in interest of the original beneficiaries of the grants made by the acts of 1862 and 1864, and the assertion of conflicting claims to the land by the defendants as successors in interest to the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company. The prayer was that the title of plaintiff might be quieted, etc.
the legal title in praesenti. It also specially set up and claimed that the Land Department had jurisdiction to determine whether the land was subject to the grant under acts of 1862 and 1864, and to determine all disputes as to who was entitled to a patent therefor; that it was not adjudged until July 24, 1903, that each company under the grant was entitled to a moiety of the lands. That, while the Land Department was holding, as above stated (because of the indemnity school selection), the land in controversy to have been excepted from the grants under the acts of 1862 and 1864, defendant in error was permitted by the local land officers of Nebraska to enter the land under the act of Congress of March 3, 1887, and that this entry was not cancelled until August 25, 1896; that, under these rulings and contests, and while the title remained in the United States, up to the issue of the joint patent, the possession of defendant in error was in no sense adverse, but was in subserviency to the title of the United States."
The plaintiff, by his reply, in substance alleged that the grants were in praesenti, and that the effect of the completion of the railroads and compliance with all the terms and conditions of the act prior to January 1, 1870, operated to pass the title of the government on or prior to that date, and that the General Land Office had not thereafter jurisdiction in respect to such lands, and that the adverse possession of the plaintiff was not affected by the proceedings had in the Land Department concerning such land.
companies to the property. The case was then brought to this Court.
"was not allowed by the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Nebraska, and it does not appear in the record by what authority the judge who allowed the writ styles himself 'Presiding Judge of the Supreme Court of Nebraska,' and because there is no federal question involved in said cause."
Looking at the record, we find that originally the writ of error was signed by "Charles B. Letton, Justice of the Supreme Court of the Nebraska," and that subsequently an additional signature was added, viz., "John B. Barnes, Presiding Judge of Supreme Court of Nebraska, in absence of Sedgwick, C.J., from this state." Obviously, in procuring the signature of Justice Letton, counsel overlooked the fact that, by § 999, Rev.Stat., it was necessary that the writ of error should be allowed by the chief justice of the court. The recital made by Justice Barnes following his signature is, however, prima facie evidence of the correctness of the statements therein contained -- viz., the absence of the Chief Justice from the state and the fact that Justice Barnes was, in his absence, the Presiding Judge of the Supreme Court of Nebraska, and counsel have not assailed the accuracy of the representations. We are of opinion that the statute was complied with. Havnor v. New York, 170 U. S. 411.
the right or title so specially set up under the United States, we possess jurisdiction.
"But when the grant is in praesenti, and nothing remains to be done for the administration of the grant in the Land Department, and the conditions of the grant have been complied with and the grant fully earned, as in this case, notwithstanding the want of final certification and the issue of the patent, the railroad company had such title as would enable it to maintain ejectment against one wrongfully on the lands, and title by prescription would run against it in favor of one in adverse possession under color of title. Deseret Salt Co. v. Tarpey, supra; Toltec Ranch Co. v. Cook, supra."
The conclusive effect of these rulings, if applicable, is not denied, but it is insisted that they are not pertinent, because the land in question was not a part of the main line grant, but was embraced within a grant for the construction of a branch road, which is so different from the grant for the construction of the main line that the branch line grant cannot be held to have been a grant in praesenti within the principle of the previous cases. We proceed to consider this contention.
constructing said branch shall not be entitled to receive in bonds an amount larger than the said Union Pacific Railroad Company would be entitled to receive if it had constructed the branch under this act and the act to which this is an amendment; but said company shall be entitled to receive alternate sections of land for ten miles in width on each side of the same along the whole length of said branch: And provided, further, That if a railroad should not be completed to Sioux City across Iowa or Minnesota within eighteen months from the date of this act, then said company designated by the President, as aforesaid, may commence, continue, and complete the construction of said branch as contemplated by the provisions of this act: Provided, however, That if the said company so designated by the President as aforesaid shall not complete the said branch from Sioux City to the Pacific Railroad within ten years from the passage of this act, then and in that case all of the railroad which shall have been constructed by said company shall be forfeited to, and become the property of, the United States."
"on the same terms and conditions as are provided in this act, and the act to which this is an amendment, for the construction of the said Union & Pacific Railroad and telegraph line and branches."
is that title to lands within the place limits passed by the main grant on the filing by the road of its map of definite location in the General Land Office. Nor is there merit in the contention that a different construction is rendered necessary by the circumstance that the road which might build up the branch from Sioux City was not or may not have been in existence at the time of the passage of the act of 1864. As well argue that, because § 7 of the act of 1862 required the Union Pacific Railroad to file its assent to the act, under the seal of the company, in the Department of the Interior, within one year after the passage of the act, that there was uncertainty as to whether the Union Pacific Company might accept,and that the grant therefore could not be said to be one in praesenti.
"said company shall be entitled to receive alternate sections of land for ten miles in width on each side of the same along the whole length of said branch,"
the government, the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company entered upon the construction of its road.
It results from the foregoing that the grant of the tract of land in controversy made by the act of 1862, and the amendatory act of 1864, to the Union Pacific Railroad Company and the Sioux City & Pacific Railroad Company, being a grant in praesenti, and third parties, on the definite location of the road, not having acquired rights in the land, the legal title attached in favor of the two companies on the filing of their maps of definite location as of the date of the grant. Such title attached long prior to the purchase of the land by Japp. When the sale was made to him, no contest was pending in respect to the land, and the statutory period of ten years, necessary in Nebraska to sustain a claim of title by adverse possession, ended prior to the various proceedings had in the General Land Office, to which we have heretofore referred, growing out of the invalid school selection and the conflicting adjudications of the Office in respect to it.
That the entry and holding of the land by Japp, the grantor of Wiese, under the purchase by Japp in 1882, and the continued possession by Wiese after he acquired the land from Japp, should be deemed to have been adverse to the title and possession of the Sioux City Company, if the possession by Japp was not that of a cotenant, and such possession was unaffected by the proceedings had in the Land Office subsequent to 1882, is not questioned. We are clearly of opinion that the possession of Japp and his grantee was adverse in the strictest sense of the term, and the acts of Wiese in seeking to acquire title from the United States under the act of 1887, with the view of removing a cloud upon his title, was not an act of recognition or acknowledgment of a superior title, either in the United States or in the Sioux City Company, operating to interrupt the continuity of his adverse possession, and, in any event, cannot be held to have destroyed a title which had already become perfect by the expiration of the statutory period in Nebraska for acquiring the legal title to land by adverse possession.

References: § 999
 § 709
 § 999
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