Case Name: Robert B. TODD, et al. v. STATE of Louisiana, Through the DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES of the State of Louisiana
Court: Louisiana Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: Louisiana
Decision Date: 1983-11-28
Citations: 456 So. 2d 1340
Docket Number: No. 82-C-2915
Parties: Robert B. TODD, et al. v. STATE of Louisiana, Through the DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES of the State of Louisiana.
Judges: DIXON, C.J., dissents with reasons.
Reporter: Southern Reporter, Second Series
Volume: 456
Pages: 1340–1361-1371

Head Matter:
Robert B. TODD, et al. v. STATE of Louisiana, Through the DEPARTMENT OF NATURAL RESOURCES of the State of Louisiana.
No. 82-C-2915.
Supreme Court of Louisiana.
Nov. 28, 1983.
On Rehearing Oct. 15, 1984.
Rehearing Granted Dee. 6,1984.
William J. Guste, Jr., Atty. Gen., Gary L. Keyser, David C. Kimmel, H. Glen Kent, Jr., Asst. Atty. Gen., for applicant.
Stephen P. Dart, Kilbourne & Dart, St. Francisville, Leslie D. Ligón, Jr., Ligón & Ware, Clinton, W. Hugh Sibley, Greens-burg, for respondents.
Ernest R. Eldred, George L. Clauer, III, Sp.Asst.Attys. Gen. and R. Gordon Kean, Jr., Leonard L. Kilgore, III and A. N. Yian-nopoulos of counsel, for amicus curiae.

Opinion:
CALOGERO, Justice.
We address in this opinion a question heretofore undecided by this Court, whether a possessory action may be brought against the State of Louisiana. The case comes to us as a result of the following natural and legal events.
Turnbull Island was originally a peninsula-like section of land in West Feliciana Parish bordering Avoyelles, Concordia and Pointe Coupee Parishes, and around which the Mississippi River looped in its journey to the Gulf of Mexico. The Red River entered the Mississippi at the northwestern bend of the loop; the Atchafalaya River branched off from the southwestern turn of the River. The land became an island in 1831 when navigational problems for river traffic on the loop and the perceived ease in channelling through the land's narrow neck to the east, resulted in the excavation of Shreve's Cut-off. Thereafter the main channel of the Mississippi River bypassed the circular journey around the island. Through the years the water remaining along the northern edge of Turnbull Island, known originally as Upper Old River, formed a thalweg (a sort of a steep depression or descent) which came to be known as Sugar Mill Chute.
The land between what is known as the 1845-47 meander line of Upper Old River to the south and the thalweg, Sugar Mill Chute, to the north, became the subject of the present controversy.
Robert Todd and Charles Haynes, Jr. bought the eastern half of Turnbull Island on June 8, 1978 from A.B. Stevens, who reserved the timber rights. On September 10, 1978, the State of Louisiana halted Stevens' timber operations on the portion of Turnbull Island between the 1845-47 meander line and Sugar Mill Chute. With legislative permission to sue, plaintiffs brought a possessory action against the State of Louisiana. In their petition, they alleged that the property on which the timber oper ations had been halted was attached to Turnbull Island, having been formed by accretion, alluvion, dereliction or reliction, and that their ancestors in title had taken possession of the property through various acts of corporeal possession for one year prior to the disturbance. The plaintiffs sought judgment restoring possession, ordering the state to file a petitory action in the matter and awarding indemnification for loss resulting from the halting of timber operations.
The state reconvened, claiming possession of the disputed tract as the former bed and bottom of the Mississippi River. They also filed exceptions of no cause/no right of action and one styled "peremptory exception of sovereign immunity." Of significance to this decision was the exception based on the property's being public and as such "not subject to alienation by the state of Louisiana." The exception went on to recite, "[cjonsequently the property is considered to be in the public domain and a possessory action cannot be filed or prosecuted against the State since property in the public domain cannot be possessed by an individual for himself." The exceptions were referred to the merits.
After trial, the court overruled all of the state's exceptions, recognized the plaintiffs' right to possession of the disputed tract, reserved to Stevens his right to seek damages for losses resulting from the state's halting the timber operations, dismissed the state's reconventional demand for possession, and ordered the state to file a petitory action within sixty days.
In overruling the exception of no cause of action which had been based on the premise that a possessory action may not be brought against the State of Louisiana, the trial judge noted that the relief granted to a plaintiff in a possessory action merely recognizes his right to possession, maintains him in his possession, and does not determine ownership or matters pertaining to acquisitive prescription.
On the merits, after examining the nature of the land in dispute, the nature of the possession' and the nature of the alleged disturbances, the trial judge found that plaintiffs had proven their right to be maintained in possession of the property. The trial court found the land in question had been formed by the excavation of Shreve's Cut-Off and accretion. Secondly, the trial judge determined that the plaintiff had proven possession of the land to which the area in dispute was attached, as well as possession of the disputed land itself. Finally this possession was shown to have been undisturbed for a year prior to the halting of the timber operations, and the evidence of occasional hunting on the property by members of the public was found not to constitute contrary possession by the state.
The Court of Appeal upheld the trial court's judgment favoring plaintiffs in this possessory action without addressing whether the land was or was not formed by accretion. The Court of Appeal noted that the latter concern more properly affects the question of ownership of the property and should be resolved in a later petitory action. However, the appellate court found that, indeed, possession of the disputed tract by the plaintiffs had been established, and that since title is not at issue in a possessory action, there is nothing inimical to the state's interest in allowing the pos-sessory action. 422 So.2d 1353 (La.App. 1st Cir.1982).
The Court of Appeal then reviewed and confirmed the acts of possession favoring the plaintiffs and denied the counterpart allegations by the state that it was in possession of the disputed area. We granted the state's application in this matter primarily to decide whether the lower courts were correct in allowing a possessory action to be maintained against the state.
It is the state's contention, essentially, that a private individual may not acquire possession of state corporeal immovables, because an individual may not "intend to possess as owner" and "take corporeal possession of [land claimed by the state]." La.C.C. art. 3424. Therefore a private individual cannot, through possession undisturbed for a year, acquire the right to bring a possessory action against the state of Louisiana, argues the state. La.C.C. art. 3422; La.C.C.P. arts. 3655, 3658.
Plaintiffs contend, on the other hand, that if the corporeal immovables claimed by the state may be possessed as possession is conceived under Louisiana law, then the right to possess should accrue after a year's undisturbed possession, and the remedy for the disturbance of that possession should be available irrespective of whether in fact it is ultimately shown that the land in dispute is state property and consequently imprescriptible.
Therefore we must decide first whether a possessory action against the state is permitted by law. The resolution of this outset issue entails a consideration of the nature of possession and the possessory action, the nature of corporeal immovables owned by the state,' the nature of objects of a possessory action, and the interplay between possession, the possessory action and acquisitive prescription. And if we find that a possessory action may be maintained against the state, we must decide whether the possessory action will be so permitted with all of the attending codal consequences. This latter question will be given distinctive treatment in this opinion.
Before beginning our discussion of whether the state may be sued under the present codal (and statutory) scheme in a possessory action, it is of more than just historical interest to note that from 1930 until the adoption of the Code of Civil Procedure in 1960, there was in effect a statute requiring that the state be treated specially in instances where a possessory action was brought against it. La.R.S. 13:5061 required:
That, whenever the State, a Municipality, Town or Village thereof, is sued as a defendant in a possessory action brought by any person, firm, or corporation claiming to possess as owner, usufructuary, or claiming a real right to property, which is also claimed by the State, a Municipality, Town or Village thereof, to be public property constituting a locus publicus, then, in such cases the possessory and petitory actions shall be cumulated and the claim of title or real right vel non, of the person, firm, or corporation bringing such possessory action shall be tried contradictorily with the claim of title of the State, Municipality, Town or Village thereof, and any judgment rendered on the petitory phase of such suit shall carry with it a determination of the pos-sessory action in favor of the party whose petitory claim has been affirmed and recognized. That all such cumulated actions of the character herein described shall be tried by preference in all courts. (Emphasis provided.)
It was suggested at the time of its passage that La.R.S. 13:5061 was enacted to relieve the problems of separating possession and ownership considerations in cases involving land claimed by private interests in competition with the state, a municipality, town or village. 5 Tul.L.Rev. 665 (1931). The inference can be made from the repeal of La.R.S. 13:5061 coincident with the enactment of the Code of Civil Procedure and the possessory/petitory articles therein (one of which forbids the cumu-lation of possessory and petitory actions) that it was the Legislature's intent that the state thereafter be treated just as other private litigants in possessory and petitory actions.
THE NATURE OF POSSESSION AND THE POSSESSORY ACTION
Possession is defined in La.C.C. art. 3421 as "the detention or enjoyment of a corporeal thing, movable or immovable, that one holds or exercises by himself or by another who keeps or exercises it in his name.... "
La.C.C. art. 3422 provides further: "Possession is a matter of fact; nevertheless, one who has possessed a thing for over a year acquires the right to possess it." Comment (b) to this latter article underscores the distinction between acquiring possession and acquiring the right to possess. Comment (b) provides in pertinent part:
Louisiana legislation and well-settled jurisprudence distinguish between possession, which is the exercise of factual authority over a thing, and the right to possess, which one may acquire by exercising such authority for over a year. See, e.g., R.C.C. (1870) Articles 3454(2) and 3455. See also Liner v. Louisiana Land and Exploration Co., 319 So.2d 766 (La.1975):
"For example, the word possession in Civil Code Articles 3426-3431, 3436-3438, means physical control over a thing that one has acquired with the intent to own it. (Possession as physical control leads, of course, to acquisitive prescription if it has the attributes required by Article 3487 of the Louisiana Civil Code of 1870.) This physical control alone, however, does not give rise to possessory protection or to acquisitive prescription. Pos-sessory protection is predicated on acquisition of the right to possess. This right to possess is acquired by one who has been for a year in peaceable and uninterrupted possession of an estate. Civil Code Articles 3454(2), 3456; cf. id. Art. 3449(2)." .
Once a person has possessed a corporeal thing, movable or immovable, in a manner which establishes a right to possession, and one's possession is subsequently disturbed in fact or in law, the Code of Civil Procedure provides a legal remedy.
La.C.C.P. art. 3655 provides:
The possessory action is one brought by the possessor of immovable property or of a real right therein to be maintained in his possession of the property or enjoyment of the right when he has been disturbed, or to be restored to the possession or enjoyment thereof when he has been evicted.
La.C.C.P. art. 3658 sets forth the requirements for maintaining a possessory action.
To maintain the possessory action the possessor must allege and prove that:
(1) He had possession of the immovable property or real right therein at the time the disturbance occurred;
(2) He and his ancestors in title had such possession quietly and without interruption for more than a year immediately prior to the disturbance, unless evicted by force or fraud;
(3) The disturbance was one in fact or in law, as defined in Article 3659; and
(4) The possessory action was instituted within a year of the disturbance.
These articles on possession and posses-sory actions do not prohibit a possessory action against the state. They are written in broad and general terms ("immovable property or a real right therein") and do not further define the kinds of immovable property which may or which may not be objects of possession, and later, of a pos-sessory action.
THE NATURE OF CORPOREAL IMMOVABLES OWNED BY THE STATE
Things under Louisiana law are divided into "common, public and private; corpore-als and incorporeals; and movables and immovables." La.C.C. art. 448. We are concerned with a corporeal immovable in this case and therefore address only the distinctions among the first three categories of things: common, public, and private.
Common Things
La.C.C. art. 449 provides: "Common things may not be owned by anyone. They are such as the air and the high seas that may be freely used by everyone comform-ably with the use for which nature has intended them."
Public Things
La.C.C. art. 450 provides:
Public things are owned by the state or its political subdivisions in their capacity as public persons.
Public things that belong to the state are such as running waters, the waters and bottoms of natural navigable water bodies, the territorial seas, and the seashore.
Public things that may belong to political subdivisions of the state are such as streets and public squares. (Emphasis provided.)
La.C.C. art. 452 provides:
Public things and common things are subject to public use in accordance with applicable laws and regulations. Everyone has the right to fish in the rivers, ports, roadsteads, and harbors, and the right to land on the seashore, to fish, to shelter himself, to moor ships, to dry nets, and the like, provided that he does not cause injury to the property of adjoining owners.
The seashore within the limits of a municipality is subject to its police power, and the public use is governed by municipal ordinances and regulations. (Emphasis provided.)
Private Things
La.C.C. art. 453 provides: "Private things are owned by individuals, other private persons, and by the state or its political subdivisions in their capacity as private persons." (Emphasis provided.) Additionally some private things may be subject to public use. La.C.C. art. 455 provides: "Private things may be subject to public use in accordance with law or by dedication."
As noted in the comment (c) of La.C.C. art. 450: "According to civilian theory, the state and its political subdivisions have dual personality. At times they act as public persons, that is, in a sovereign capacity, and at times as private persons, that is, as private citizens or corporations."
Property of the state, then, may be in the nature of public things or in the nature of private things. Public things are those held "out of commerce . dedicated to public use, and held as a public trust, for public uses." City of New Orleans v. Carrollton Land Co., 131 La. 1092, 1095, 60 So. 695, 696 (1913).
Public things are inalienable under legislative and constitutional provisions. See generally comments, La.C.C. art. 450. The state constitution specifically designates certain public things as inalienable. La. Const, art. IX § 3 (bed of navigable water body); La. Const, art. IX § 4(A) (mineral rights on property sold by the state). Additionally the state constitution specifically provides that "no public property . shall be subject to seizure" (La. Const, art. XII § 10(C)) and that "[ljands and mineral interest of the state . shall not be lost by prescription" (La. Const, art. IX § 4(B)).
By contrast, private things of the state or its political subdivisions are alienable "in accordance with existing statutes and regulations." Wright v. Sabine River Authority, 308 So.2d 402 (La.App. 3rd Cir.), writ refused, 313 So.2d 245 (La.1975). Accord Anderson v. Thomas, 166 La. 512, 117 So. 573 (1928); Landry v. Council of Parish of East Baton Rouge, 220 So.2d 795 (La.App. 1st Cir.1969). Concerning private things generally, La.C.C. art. 454 provides that the "(o)wners of private things may freely dispose of them under modifications established by law." Comment (c) to this article states unequivocally: "Things belonging to the state, its political subdivisions, and agencies, may be disposed of in accordance with the applicable laws and regulations."
THE NATURE OF OBJECTS OF A POSSESSORY ACTION
Under French law, "[c]orporeal immov-ables can be the object of a possessory action bearing on the possession of the land itself only if they are in commerce and, as such, susceptible of being acquired by adverse possession (footnote omitted)." Au-bry & Rau, 2 Civil Law Translations — Property § 185, 129 (7th ed. 1966). The key to the possession of corporeal immovables in France seems to lie in the land's being in commerce. Under the French scheme, if the corporeal immovables were in commerce, and as such, (i.e. because of their commercial availability) susceptible of being acquired by adverse possession, the land was equally amenable to being "the object of a possessory action bearing on the possession of the land." Thus it is not the ability to acquire by adverse possession that sets the stage for the availability of a possessory action; rather, by implication from French theory, it is the state of being "in commerce" which triggers the availability of the possessory action. The ability to acquire by adverse possession is only ind-dental to the requirement that the corporeal immovables be "in commerce."
Aubry & Rau supra illustrates those corporeal immovables which, at least under French law, are incapable of being possessed because they are not in commerce.
The following can not, for this reason, be protected by possessory actions: lands occupied by war fortifications, sea coast, national or departmental highways, local roads, public streets and squares, rights of way of navigation canals and artifical dikes of navigable rivers, cemeteries and churches. (Footnotes omitted)
On the other hand according to the French commentators Aubry & Rau, corporeal immovables in the private domain, even those in the private domain of the state, may be "object[s] of a possessory action bearing on the possession of the land itself," and "[t]his applies especially to sea relictions (lais et reíais), and even river beds from which water has permanently receded were held to be relictions." (Footnotes omitted) (Emphasis provided) Au-bry & Rau, supra at 130. Accord Planiol, I Civil Law Treatise, Part 2 § 3068A, 3082, at 816, 824 (1959).
The availability of a possessory action against corporeal immovables of the state, according to the French commentators, turns then on the classification of the corporeal immovable as either a public or private thing.
Under our jurisprudence, a possessory action has not been allowed in regard to "public" property. Bruning v. City of New Orleans, 165 La. 511, 115 So. 733 (1926); Martin et al v. City of Lafayette, 162 La. 262, 110 So. 415 (1926). In Brun-ing, 115 So. at 737 (on first rehearing), we framed the question concerning possession of private and public things as follows:
Suffice it to say that, if the property in controversy be of a nature subject to private ownership and exclusive private possession, then our former decree [enjoining the city from entering the land in dispute] is correct, and should be reinstated.
On the other hand, if the property in controversy be of that class of public things, "the property of which is vested in a whole nation, and the use of which is allowed to all (R.C.C. art. 453)," such as the seashore, being "that space of land, over which the waters of the sea spread in the highest water, during the winter season (R.C.C. art. 451)," or such as the streets and public squares of a city (R.C.C. art. 454), then mere physical possession thereof by a private individual "is not such a possession as entitles the possessor to maintain himself against the public until ousted by a petitory action; that the public is entitled to enter thereon at once." Martin v. City of Lafayette, 162 La. 262, 110 So. 415, and authorities there cited.
The same is also true of land actually covered by the waters of the sea {Milne v. Girodeau, 12 La. 324); nor does it make any difference that such land be uncovered even for whole seasons at a time, if in fact it be subject to periodical inundation by the regular rise or flow of the water at the appropriate season (Sapp v. Frazier, 51 La.Ann. 1718, 26 So. 378, 72 Am.St.Rep. 493).
On second rehearing in Bruning, we upheld the municipality's right to enter the lakefront property (rejecting the Brun-ings' possessory action) finding that "[n]o complaint, apparently, was ever made by plaintiff, by her husband, or by her sons, of the action of the authorities in consistently claiming and treating the property in dispute as a locus publicus." We reversed the earlier decision, however, insofar as "it purported] to determine finally the ownership of the property." 115 So. at 738.
On the other hand when property is "private", a possessory action has been permitted. Moran v. City of New Orleans, 170 La. 499, 128 So. 290 (1930). In Moran, when the city sought to remove the plaintiffs wire fence and replace it with a board fence to exercise control over what the city alleged was "locus publicus," the plaintiff filed a possessory action to enjoin the city from interfering with her possession and control of the property. In upholding the plaintiff's right to be quieted in her possession of the property, this Court found:
The record shows that the property involved in this suit was subject to private ownership; that plaintiff was in the actual possession of it at the instant when the disturbance alleged in the petition occurred; that she had possessed the property quietly and without interruption, under a claim of ownership, for many years prior to the disturbance, and that defendant had never, theretofore, asserted claim to any part of it, or attempted to exercise any dominion over it.
The record does not show that the property involved was ever dedicated, by any of its former owners, to public uses. A map and certain sales with reference thereto are relied upon as impliedly dedicating the property as a locus publicus, but no connection between the confection of the map and the owner of the property is shown. Hence, if the title to the property could be inquired into in this proceeding, we seriously question whether the offerings referred to could be given the effect contended for by defendant. 128 So. at 291.
Therefore while public things may not be objects of possession by private individuals, our jurisprudence, consistent with Louisiana's Civil Code and French theories, allows private things (the ownership of which is in dispute as between a private litigant and a sovereign) to be the objects of a possessory action. And our courts have awarded judgment favorable to the private litigant when the private nature of the property has been established and the plaintiff suing the sovereign has satisfied the other requirements for success in a possessory action. Moran, 128 So. 290. Thus, the success or failure of a possessory action against the state will depend in part on the judicial determination concerning the nature of the object of that possessory action, that is whether the property is public or private in nature.
THE INTERPLAY OF POSSESSION, THE POSSESSORY ACTION, AND ACQUISITIVE PRESCRIPTION
Notwithstanding the above, the state argues that the constitutional prohibition against the state's losing its lands (either public or private, A. Yiannopoulous, 2 La. Civ.Law Treatise § 34, 95 et seq. (1980)) through acquisitive prescription, prevents a possessor from having the requisite outset "intent to possess" state property and always bars a possessory action against the state, irrespective of the public or private nature of the property. The question thus becomes whether possession of land is so inextricably tied to the land's being subject to acquisitive prescription (upon a showing of adverse possession), that the legal inability to so acquire the property bars the kind of possession (i.e., with the intent to possess as owner) which is necessary to trigger the right to maintain a possessory action after a year of undisturbed possession. We find that the inability to acquire private property belonging to the state by acquisitive prescription does not bar a possessory action against the state.
Admittedly, the "intent to possess" in a possessory action has been found to be similar in nature to that required of a person seeking to acquire property by prescription. City of New Orleans v. New Orleans Canal, Inc., 412 So.2d 975 (La.1982); Norton v. Addie, 337 So.2d 432 (La.1976); Liner v. Louisiana Land and Exploration Company, 319 So.2d 766 (La.1975); Note, 49 Tul.Law Review 1173 (1975). Admittedly, too, the possessory action is oftentimes but the "skirmishing ground for the impending contest as to ownership." Writ System in Real Actions, 22 Tul.Law Review 459 at 467 (1948). However, the fact that one action may in the usual course precede another does not mean that availability of the latter is a sine qua non of the former.
While the precept tantum praescriptum quantum possessum ("It is clear that I cannot acquire by prescription what I have not possessed." G. Baudry — Lacantinerie & Albert Tissier, 5 Civil Law Translations 298, 158 (4th Edition, 1924)) is indisputable, the reverse ("I cannot possess what I cannot acquire by prescription") is not necessarily true. It depends on the reason that the property is not subject to being acquired by prescription. On the one hand, if the state land cannot be acquired by prescription because it is inalienable, the land clearly cannot be the object of a possessory action since alienability (the state of being in commerce) is a prerequisite for such an action. This is exactly what prohibits the bringing of a possessory action when the object of that action is "public" land, which is inalienable. However if the state land cannot be acquired by prescription because of some reason other than its inalienability, then the principles of possession are not offended by the prohibition against acquisitive prescription.
As stated earlier, land which the state owns in its private capacity is alienable in accordance with applicable laws and regulations, and so is in commerce. What bars the prescriptive acquisition of land which the state owns in its private capacity is not the nature of the property, for the property is in commerce and thus alienable; but rather a constitutional prohibition expressly designed to prohibit the loss of state lands. Allowing a possessory action is not mimical to the public policy manifested through the constitutional prohibition because a private litigant cannot acquire ownership through the possessory action, nor will the state thus lose title to its lands should a litigant succeed against the state in a possessory action.
The availability of a possessory action then depends not upon whether the given property is subject to being acquired by adverse possession and prescription, but upon whether the property is of the sort which can be freely disposed of by individuals, by other private persons, or by the state in its capacity as a private person. This is akin to the French distinction that corporeal immovables can be objects of a possessory action if they are in commerce, irrespective of ownership. Therefore our civilian tradition as derived from the French does not foreclose an outset posses-sory action against the state.
It is only because of the constitutional prohibition against losing state lands by prescription, and our jurisprudence to the effect that the possession in a possessory action is of a kind similar to that required for acquisitive prescription that the argument is made that a possessory action is foreclosed at the outset against the state. The argument is not persuasive for the reasons which we will discuss in the next section of this opinion, and considering our resolution which makes the possessory action available without compromising the constitutional proscription to the running of prescription against the state.
If the land in dispute is public property which is not alienable (such as navigable waterbodies or dedicated public streets, for example), private individuals may not succeed in a possessory action against the state. On the other hand if the land in dispute is private in nature, subject perhaps to conflicting claims by private persons and/or the state in its private capacity, the constitutional prohibition against the state's losing lands by prescription does not preclude the availability of the posses-sory action against the state, with its focus simply upon whether or not the plaintiff has held himself out as owner for over a year.
Furthermore, referring to land as "public" at the outset of a possessory action in order to argue that it is inalienable, and may not be acquired by prescription, and thus cannot be the object of a possessory action, presupposes a state of affairs which may well not be the case. It presupposes that the property in question is owned by the state.
Only state lands may not be lost by prescription. Therefore, in order for the constitutional prohibition against losing lands by prescription to apply, there must be proof that the land in question is indeed state land. State of La. Dept, of Natural Resources, Div. of State Lands v. Talley, 413 So.2d 201 (La.App. 4th Cir.1982). Such proof of ownership is foreign to the limited issues in a possessory action. A party bringing a possessory action need not allege or prove that the property is not owned by the defendant, nor that he has title to the land; nor must the Court address the matter of ownership in order to rule in a possessory action.
The state, of course, will defeat the pos-sessory action if they can show that the disputed property is "public," be it by nature or by use. La.C.C. arts. 450 and 455.
The private litigant plaintiff otherwise entitled will succeed in the possessory action if the disputed property is shown to be "private" in nature, irrespective of whether the owner is ultimately found to be a private person or the state in its private capacity. La.C.C. art. 453. The possibility that in a later instituted petitory action or some other action (concursus for instance) the state may prove ownership of the property (and, as a consequence, the property's impre-scriptible nature), is not offended by the outset availability of the possessory action in which ownership of the property is not at issue.
Additionally, the fact that it is later determined that the property may not be acquired by prescription (should it ultimately be shown that the state owns it) does not mean that the possessor did not "intend to possess" as owner. There may be, as here, a legitimate dispute over the ownership of the property. See Esso Standard Oil Co. v. Jones, 233 La. 915, 98 So.2d 236 (1957). In this case, for instance, referring to the land in dispute as state land presupposes a determination not yet adjudicated, that the land in dispute is not accretion, as the plaintiffs suggest, but swamp overfill resting on the bed of a once navigable river. Such a determination will more properly be made in a petitory, or perhaps some other, action.
CONSEQUENCES OF MAINTAINING A POSSESSORY ACTION AGAINST THE STATE
The relief which may be granted a successful plaintiff in a possessory action is set forth in La.C.C.P. art. 3662 as follows: A judgment rendered for the plaintiff in a possessory action shall:
(1)Recognize his right to the possession of the immovable property or real right therein, and restore him to possession thereof if he has been evicted, or maintain him in possession thereof if the disturbance has not been an eviction;
(2) Order the defendant to assert his adverse claim of ownership of the immovable property or real right therein in a petitory action to be filed within a delay to be fixed by the court not to exceed sixty days after the date the judgment becomes executory, or be precluded thereafter from asserting the ownership thereof, if the plaintiff has prayed for such relief; and
(3) Award him the damages to which he is entitled and which he has prayed for.
Certain of the advantages ascribed by law to the winner in a possessory action lawsuit are permissible when applied against the state. There are, however, two distinct problems which arise as a result of a private plaintiff's winning a pos-sessory action against the state. The first of these has to do with the type of burden which the state has to bear after losing a possessory lawsuit if it chooses to litigate the question of its ownership of the disputed land. The second problem has to do with whether or not the judicial directive La.C.C.P. art. 3662(2) to the losing litigant in a possessory action to file a petitory action within sixty days or be precluded thereafter from making an ownership claim to the property can apply to the state.
With respect to the former (the burden of proof when the state brings a petitory action or otherwise chooses to litigate its title), we make the following observations.
A private defendant/loser in a possesso-ry action, as a plaintiff thereafter in the petitory action or other ownership contest or concursus proceeding, prior to 1981 had to "make out his title thereto." See La.C. C.P. art. 3653(1) (before amended in 1981) relative to proof of title in a petitory action when his opponent is in possession; and La.C.C.P. art. 3654(1) (before amended in 1981) relative to proof of title in an action for declaratory judgment, concursus, expropriation, or similar proceeding where the opponent would be entitled to possession in a possessory action. In Pure Oil Co. v. Skinner, 204 So.2d 797 (La.1974), this Court decided that the charge to "make out his title thereto" required that the plaintiff "prove valid record title, . show title good against the world without regard to the title of the party in possession." 294 So.2d at 799.
In 1981, Act No. 256, § 1 amended La.C. C.P. arts. 3653 and 3654 to substitute for "make out his title thereto" the clause "prove that he has acquired ownership from a previous owner or by acquisitive prescription". Given that state of affairs today, a private litigant in a petitory action must "prove that he has acquired ownership from a previous owner or by acquisitive prescription," if his opponent is in possession.
Just what the burden would be upon the state in a petitory or other ownership action under La.C.C.P. arts. 3653 and 3654 as amended, is not entirely clear. No doubt the state in the petitory proceeding would point to the fact that unlike a private litigant, the state may derive title or ownership not simply by acquisition from a previous owner and/or by prescription but, as well, in other ways, not the least of which is the ownership of lands at the state's inception. See generally 27 Tul.L.Rev. 59 (1952). Just what burden of proof will be required of the state in a subsequent action to establish its ownership is not before us at this time, in this case. And we need not decide it now.
With respect to the latter concern about the option available to the plaintiff in La.C. C.P. art. 3662(2), to have the judge set a deadline not to exceed sixty days within which the defendant/loser in a possessory action must bring his petitory action, there is constitutional and legal reason to bar application to the state of that provision. This reason is based partly on the public policy consideration attending the Constitution's prohibiting the loss of state lands by acquisition prescription. More pointedly, however, it is based on the constitutional proscription to the running of liberative prescription against the state, a provision which has been incorporated in our state constitutions since 1898. "Prescription shall not run against the state in any civil matter, unless otherwise provided in this constitution or expressly by law." La. Const, art. 12 § 13, La. Const, art. 19 § 16 (1921), La. Const, art. 193 (1913 and 1898).
The sixty day period in La.C.C.P. art. 3662(2), within which the trial judge when asked must tell the loser in a possessory action to file a petitory action, fits indeed within the parameters of liberative pre scription. This sixty (60) day period finds its source in the jactitory action, a jurispru-dentially-created action which subsisted as a way of handling slander of title actions. International Paper Co. v. Louisiana Central Lumber Co., 202 La. 621, 639, 12 So.2d 659 (1943); Siegel v. Helis, 186 La. 506, 172 So. 768 (1937) and cases cited therein at 172 So. at 771; Packwood v. Dorsey, 4 La.Ann. 90 (1849). In 1960 with the adoption of the Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure, the former jactitory action was merged with the former possessory action. 35 Tul.L.Rev. 541 (1961). That the sixty day period is a form of liberative prescription is evident from jurisprudential history of the jactitory action. Siegel, 172 So. 771, Packwood, 4 La.Ann. 90.
To give effect to La.C.C.P. art. 3662(2) and the sixty day period when the state is the loser in a possessory action would impose on the state a form of liberative prescription, which is constitutionally impermissible under La. Const, art. 12 § 13. "Prescription shall not run against the stae in any civil matter, unless otherwise provided in the constitution or expressly by law." Nowhere in the constitution, nor expressly in La.C.C.P. art. 3662(2) or any other statute is there provision for the sixty day period to run against the state. Yet as we have indicated earlier in this opinion the possessory action, as jurisprudentially permitted against the sovereign, insofar as private property is concerned, fits clearly within the codal scheme of the property articles of the Civil Code, and is consistent with our French tradition as well. Therefore, allowing a private litigant to maintain a possessory action against the state is statutorily, constitutionally and jurispru-dentially supported; although the sixty day mandate in La.C.C.P. art. 3662(2) for bringing a petitory action, as applied to the state, is constitutionally impermissible.
Our pretermitting the question as to the extent of the state's burden as plaintiff in a petitory or other action after defeat in a possessory action, and our deciding that the sixty day period, whether peremptive or prescriptive, is unconstitutional as applied to the state, answers a serious argument against permitting the possessory action against the state. That argument is based upon public policy. It is suggested that there is untold property or acreage which the state owns or may own which is exposed to loss to possessors, notwithstanding the constitutional proscription to the state's losing lands by acquisitive prescription. Under our resolution of the matter before us, no state lands are open to loss by prescription. The possessor simply can never acquire title by prescription. The state will not lose its lands by a failure on the part of its agents to act within a certain time frame because La.C.C.P. art. 3663(2)'s limitation is unconstitutional as applied to the state and therefore of no force and effect.
Therefore, for all of the foregoing reasons, we find that a possessory action may be maintained against the state. We affirm its availability, except that the plaintiffs option in La.C.C.P. art. 3663(2) to ask the judge to require in the judgment that the defendant file a petitory action within a stated period not to exceed sixty days is not constitutionally permissible when the state is the loser in the possessory action. Additionally we add a caveat (acknowledging that the issue is not before us in this case) that we have not determined what the state's burden of proof will be, if and when, after losing a possessory action to a private litigant, the state seeks to assert its ownership in a petitory or other proceeding.
CONCLUSION
Having determined that a possessory action is available when its object is a private thing, even where an opposing claim is made by the sovereign, we turn to the particular circumstances of the matter before us.
In this case, the land in dispute is either the former bed and bottom of the Mississippi River, or land formed by accretion, allu-vion, derelicition or reliction. In either case, the land in dispute is a "private thing." The beds of formerly navigable waterbodies are private things of the state. Wemple v. Eastham, 150 La. 247, 90 So. 637 (1922); A. Yiannopoulous, 2 La. Civ.Law Treatise § 46, 132 (1980). Lands formed by accretion, alluvion, dereliction or reliction are privately owned by the riparian landowners. La.C.C. art. 499. The land in dispute, being a private thing may, then, be the object of a possessory action. The exception of no cause of action was properly overruled.
In deciding the possession issue, the trial judge referred to the disputed area as accretion, a matter which he did not have to resolve at this stage of the litigation because the question involves ownership considerations and is to be decided conclusively in the petitory or later real action, and which the Court of Appeal properly preter-mitted. Secondly, and more significantly for our purposes, the trial judge found that the plaintiffs had proven their possession of the disputed area of land itself. Proof of the plaintiffs' possession included timber cutting, providing for timber management, execution of hunting leases over periods of time and the building and maintaining of fences. Occasional hunting by the general public did not establish the state's possession, nor were there established any earlier interruptions of the plaintiffs' possession for one year preceding the state's halting of Stevens' timber operations.
The Court of Appeal found it unnecessary to decide whether the land in dispute was formed by accretion or from swamp overfill, since it found that such questions are more properly to be addressed in the petitory action. The Court of Appeal, however, affirmed the trial court's decision that the plaintiffs had enjoyed over one year of uninterrupted and peaceable possession of the disputed tract immediately preceding the state's disturbance. The Court of Appeal stated at 422 So.2d at 1355:
We agree that plaintiffs possessed by their acts on the disputed tract itself. We, therefore, do not reach the question of civil possession of accretion by actions on an adjoining riparian tract only.
Defendant next argues that the State maintained possession of the disputed tract through corporeal possession of portions of the old river bed. However, we agree with the finding that plaintiffs have sufficiently proven that they possessed the property for one year prior to the disturbance, through the following acts: cutting of timber from 1957 to 1962, negotiating a hunting lease requiring the construction of a fence, cutting of timber in the 1930's and the 1950's, establishing a timber management program, conducting timber-cruises, execution of grazing leases, and the sale of a portion of the land to the U.S. Govern ment in which the State was not made a party to the condemnation.
Once the plaintiffs are found to have possession, that possession continues until another forcibly expels them or they permit the property to be usurped and held for more than one year. La.Civil Code Art. 3449; Liner v. Louisiana Land & Exploration Company, 319 So.2d 766 (La.1975). Seasonal hunting by the public on the disputed tract was inadequate to establish corporeal possession in the State or to usurp plaintiffs' possession. Norton v. Addie, 337 So.2d 432 (La.1976). Plaintiffs filed this pos-sessory action in response to the one time that the State halted timber operations on the disputed tract. The campsite leases granted by the State were outside of the disputed tract. Defendant has not shown that plaintiffs have been expelled, or have acquiesced in a usurpation.
We agree with the Court of Appeal. Whether the land was or was not formed by accretion affects ownership, and is properly pretermitted, to be determined only in connection with a later filed petitory or other action. As discussed earlier we have found that a possessory action is available in this ease, given the private nature of the land in dispute, even should its ownership ultimately be found to rest in the state. Finally, the record contains sufficient proof of plaintiffs' peaceable and uninterrupted possession for over a year prior to the disturbance by the state. For the reasons stated more fully above, the only impermissible portion of the judgment below was that ordering the state to bring a petitory action within sixty days (paragraph five of the district court judgment).
Decree
For the foregoing reasons, the lower courts' judgments are affirmed except insofar as they "order [the state] to bring a petitory action against the plaintiffs to assert any claim of ownership that [the state] has to the property . within sixty (60) days after this judgment becomes executo-ry or be precluded thereafter from asserting the ownership thereof."
JUDGMENT AMENDED; OTHERWISE AFFIRMED.
DIXON, C.J., dissents with reasons.
MARCUS, J., dissents and assigns reasons.
LEMMON, J., dissents.
. Chaney v. State Mineral Board of Louisiana, 433 So.2d 712, was consolidated with this case for the purpose of briefing and argument, on the question of the availability of a possessory action against the state. Chaney, which involves an additional issue, has not yet been decided by this Court.
. An outline map of the area in question shows the following:
. Reports at the time stated that within two days of the cut, the River's current had deepened the channel to allow the free flow of river traffic over what had formerly been the isthmus connecting Turnbull Island to the east bank of the Mississippi River.
. To complete the geographical picture of the area: what was formerly the southern half of the Mississippi River's loop around Turnbull Island was and is called Lower Old River and still connects at the east with the River. The Red River is the island's boundary to the west and joins at the southwestern tip of Turnbull Island with the Atchafalaya River at its point of origin and with Lower Old River.
.At the time suit was filed House Concurrent Resolution No. 82 of 1979 authorized suit against the State of Louisiana by Robert Bradley Todd, Charles Frank Haynes, Jr., and A.B. Stevens to "prosecute any suit now pending, against the state of Louisiana, through the Department of Natural Resources and/or the State Mineral Board on a claim of ownership and/or possession of former or present water bottoms and minerals associated with said bottoms adjacent to Turnbull Island, portions of said island being located in West Feliciana, Concordia and Avoyelles Parishes." Later Concurrent Resolution No. 253 of 1980 amended and supplemented HCR No. 82 so as to add the word "timber" between the words "water bottoms" and "minerals."
. The basis for the other exception of no right of action was that the disturbance alleged in plaintiff's petition related solely to the disturbance of the timber estate within the possession of Stevens, the timber owner, and not that of the landowner. Additionally the peremptory exception of sovereign immunity alleged that HCR No. 82 did not authorize suit against the state for disturbance of the timber estate but only authorized suit for possession/ownership of the former or present waterbottom of the Mississippi River. In overruling these exceptions, the trial judge found the landowner, as well as the timberowner, was disturbed by the state's action, and that HCR No. 253 had satisfied the requirement that there be legislative authorization to sue. See note 3, supra.
. La.C.C.P. arts. 3651 through 3664 in Title II, Real Actions, Chapter 1, "Actions to Determine Ownership or Possession," of the Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure relate to the possessory and petitory actions. Essentially those articles set forth a comprehensive scheme by which possession and ownership of land is established.
. Act 82 of 1930 which became La.R.S. 13:5061 in the Revised Statutes of 1950 was repealed by Act 32 of 1960 at the time of passage of Act 15 of 1960 which adopted the Louisiana Code of Civil Procedure.
. To acquire possession, one need simply intend to possess as owner and take corporeal possession of the thing [La.C.C. art. 3424] whereas the right to possess, or to maintain a possessory action involves, additionally, peaceable and uninterrupted possession for a year.
.These examples from the French are similar in nature to the classification of public things, and private things subject to public use, in the Louisiana Civil Code. La.C.C. arts. 450, 452, 455.
.In France, immovables in private domain of the state are in commerce and can be acquired by adverse possession. Aubry & Rau, supra at 130. Therefore the sovereign is subject to being sued by a private interest in a possessory action.
Additionally, even if there is question as to the nature of the property, Aubry & Rau notes a possessory action might be maintained even against property in the public domain:
[W]e must admit that since trees and hedges planted on public domain are susceptible of an appropriation independent from the ownership of the land, a possessory action by a private person against a municipality for the purpose of retaining the possession of a hedge planted on municipal land can not be denied on grounds that the land is imprescriptible as part of the public domain. (Footnotes omitted.) Supra at 136.
.Arguably Louisiana's constitutional prohibition against the state's losing land, private or public, by prescription, distinguishes our law from the French (See Aubry & Rau, supra at 130: "Immovables in private domain of the state . can be acquired by adverse possession.") However, as we discuss more fully hereinafter in this opinion, this inability to acquire by prescription does not foreclose the availability of a possessory action. The constitutional prohibition against the running of prescription against the state only limits somewhat the other wise applicable procedural possessory/petitory scheme.
. But see Parkway Development Corporation v. City of Shreveport, 342 So.2d 151 (La. 1977), in which a railroad company and its lessee were permitted to file a possessory action against a municipality in a dispute involving public property. The Court pretermitted the question of whether suit against public property itself was permissible, finding the object of the possessory action was not the public land itself but rather simply the right to occupy and use the public land, a right which had been expressly granted to the litigants by the municipality.
. This case involves good faith possessors who claim to possess as owners through title and accretion. We do not have here a bad faith possessor asserting a possessory action against the state.
. A possessor may seek reimbursement for certain expenses and improvements, may retain the thing itself until reimbursed, and if in good faith may retain the fruits of the things possessed. La.C.C. art. 485, 486, 488, 527, 528, 529; La.C.C., art. 3423, comment (b).
. Pure Oil Co. v. Skinner, 294 So.2d 797 (La.1974), was a concursus proceeding instituted by Pure Oil Co. as owner of oil, gas and mineral leases to property over which two claimants were disputing. As one of the claimants was clearly in possession, the other had to "make out his title" under La.C.C.P. art. 3654.
. Lincoln Parish School Board v. Rustan College, 162 So.2d 419, writ denied, 246 La. 355, 164 So.2d 354 (1964).
. Even if this Court were to decide later that the state, just like the private litigant in Pure Oil v. Skinner, has a heavy burden in a petitory action or other real action involving the ownership of property, following an unfavorable judgment in a possessory action (and this is mere speculation at this point), it is worth noting that the Legislature has it within its power to adopt the statute, La.R.S. 13:5061 which prevailed between 1930 and 1960. Under La.R.S. 13:5061 as quoted in full earlier in this opinion, the plaintiff in a possessory action against the state must couple such action with a petitory action. Therefore the burden of proving title would rest on that party as plaintiff, rather than on the state as defendant.
. Sometimes this sixty day period has been called peremptive. Collier v. Marks, 220 La. 521, 57 So.2d 43 (1952). Canada v. Frost Lumber Industries, 9 So.2d 338 (La.App.2d Cir.1942). Such classification does not change the legal reasoning in this case. In Flowers v. Rausch, 364 So.2d 928, 931 (La.1978), we determined that "peremption, but a form of prescription, does 'not run against the state in any civil matter, unless otherwise provided in the constitution or expressly by law.' La. Const, art. 12 § 13."
. The origin of the jactitory action was summarized in Packwood v. Dorsey, 4 La.Ann 90 at 93 (1849) as follows:
[I]n Spain judges were in the habit of fixing a term within which a person setting up a title to property in the possession of another was bound to institute his suit, under the penalty of perpetual silence.... It appears that these judgments rested for their legality upon no legislative sanction, nor any recognized principle of the civil law, but entirely on an extension of a law of the Code of Justinian known as the law Diffamari. By this law, whoever defamed the condition of a person born free, could be compelled to exhibit his proofs and make them good in a court of justice, and in default thereof be condemned to perpetual silence in relation to the slander. The dignity which the law attached to the condition of a Roman citizen, and the protection which it threw over the personal rights of all those subject to its dominion, explain at once the purpose and policy of this salutary provision.