Opinion ID: 2339708
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: Maintenance of the Quiet Title Actions

Text: In the instant case the plaintiffs invoked the Declaratory Judgments Act, 14 M.R.S.A. §§ 5951-5963 (1980), as a procedural vehicle for defining rights in real property. The Act is remedial in nature and should be liberally construed to provide a simple and effective means by which parties may secure a binding judicial determination of their rights. Hodgdon v. Campbell, 411 A.2d 667, 669 (Me.1980). While the source of jurisdiction to quiet title is found in the quiet title provisions, 14 M.R.S.A. §§ 6651-6662 (1980 & Supp. 1985-1986), the Declaratory Judgments Act creates a more adequate and flexible remedy, avoiding the arcane intricacies found in the procedural requirements of the quiet title provisions. Hodgdon, 411 A.2d at 669. We have noted that a declaratory judgment proceeding is a particularly efficacious method for quieting title to real property. Id. at 669-70. The plaintiffs in the instant case have the burden of proving title in themselves both to the intertidal zone and the upland. Id. at 671. The State and Town, however, bear the burden of proving their affirmative defenses asserting the existence of a public right to use the intertidal zone and the upland for recreational purposes. M.R.Civ.P. 8(c); Hodgdon, 411 A.2d at 670-71 (The party who asserts the affirmative of the controlling issues in the case, whether or not he is the nominal plaintiff in the action, bears the risk of non-persuasion.). Recognizing, however, that the Declaratory Judgments Act alone does not override sovereign immunity when that doctrine is properly applied, we turn then to examine the determinative question in the instant appeal: does the doctrine of sovereign immunity bar this suit? Cf. Drake v. Smith, 390 A.2d 541, 544 (Me. 1978). We first examine whether the State's interest, if any, in the intertidal zone is such as would make it an indispensable party in this case. As the foregoing discussion of the Colonial Ordinance makes clear, the plaintiffs and not the State presumptively hold the fee simple title to the intertidal zone at Moody Beach. [14] The plaintiffs' title is subject to the public right of use declared by the Colonial Ordinance. The 1648 Book of the General Lawes and Libertyes, as indicated above, designated this right as a Liberty Common, a category that included only two other rights: a right of free speech in public assemblies and a right to leave the colony. Thus under the Colonial Ordinance the public right to use the intertidal zone was seen in terms of an individual freedom. As Chief Justice Shaw wrote, the great purpose of the enactment was to declare a great principle of public right, to abolish the forest laws, the game laws, and the laws designed to secure several and exclusive fisheries and to make them all free. Commonwealth v. Alger, 61 Mass. (7 Cush.) 53, 68 (1851). The Colonial Ordinance did not designate who owned or held the right to use the intertidal zone, just as we would not attempt to designate who owns freedom of speech. In Marshall v. Walker, 93 Me. 532, 45 A. 497 (1910), we characterized the public right under the Colonial Ordinance to use the intertidal zone for navigation and fishing to be an easement. Id. at 536, 540, 45 A. at 498, 499. See also Hill v. Lord, 48 Me. 83, 99 (1861) (Aquatic rights, of whatever kind, when held by those not owning the soil, are considered easements.); Comment, The Public Trust Doctrine in Maine's Submerged Lands: Public Rights, State Obligation and the Role of the Courts, 37 Me.L.Rev. 105, 112 (1985) (public easement in the intertidal zone). [15] Characterizing the public right to use the intertidal zone as a public easement is in accord with the doctrine, long accepted in Maine, that the public at large is capable of acquiring a non-possessory interest in land. Town of Manchester v. Augusta Country Club, 477 A.2d 1124 (Me.1984); Littlefield v. Hubbard, 124 Me. 299, 302-304, 128 A. 285, 287-88 (1925). Treat v. Lord, 42 Me. 552 (1856), involved the distinction between state ownership and a public easement. By legislative resolve and deed Massachusetts conveyed land located in the then District of Maine to the plaintiffs' predecessor in title. Id. at 559-60. While the resolve and deed conveyed all of the Commonwealth's property rights in the land over which a navigable stream passed, it did not convey the public easement to use the stream for the passage of logs despite the right of the Commonwealth to control, abridge, or even destroy such easement ... by virtue of its sovereignty, or right of eminent domain. Id. at 560. Thus in Treat we rejected the contention that Massachusetts as sovereign held the public easement and had the power to convey it by conveying all its right, title and interest in and to the land. Id. (emphasis in original). Similarly, in regard to the intertidal zone, we have never indicated that any entity other than the public at large owns or holds this public easement and see no need to do so in the instant case. Nor can the State contend that it is a trustee of the public easement in the intertidal zone at Moody Beach. A trustee is a person or entity that holds trust property for the benefit of another. 1 G. Bogert, The Law of Trust and Trustees § 1 at 4-5 (2d ed. rev. 1984). Accordingly, we have stated that the State holds the title ownership of the public lots and great ponds as a trustee for the public. E.g., Cushing v. Cohen, 420 A.2d 919, 923 (Me. 1980) (public lots); Conant v. Jordan, 107 Me. 227, 230, 77 A. 938, 939 (1910) (great pond). Here, however, because the plaintiffs and not the State hold the fee simple title, the trustees, if any, of Moody Beach would be the plaintiffs. We do not, however, need to decide that point. Instead, in this case in which the plaintiffs do not seek to have the public easement in the intertidal zone extinguished, but to have its scope and nature declared, the questions are who may seek enforcement of that easement and by what means. In the instant case it is clear that the Town would have standing as a plaintiff to assert the public easement in the intertidal zone. Augusta Country Club, 477 A.2d at 1128-29. [16] An individual defendant may assert the public easement under the Colonial Ordinance as a defense in a trespass or quiet title action. E.g., Andrews v. King, 124 Me. 361, 129 A. 298 (1925) (trespass); Marshal v. Walker, 93 Me. 532, 45 A. 497 (1900) (quiet title action). Accordingly, we have permitted a great variety of actions involving claims to title or possession of the intertidal zone to proceed in the State's absence, including most notably at least two quiet title actions. [17] To depart from these precedents at this late date would be a drastic step incompatible with the doctrine of stare decisis and the stability of the legal concepts of property in the State. Because the State does not assert any title in the intertidal zone, because the public rights of use constitute an easement in the public at large that may be asserted by the Town and individual defendants, and because we have consistently permitted title and possessory actions pertaining to the intertidal zone to proceed in the State's absence, we hold that the State is not an indispensable party. See M.R.Civ.P. 19(b). [18] Since the State is not an indispensable party, the court erred by its ruling that sovereign immunity barred the quiet title actions to the intertidal zone. Since the quiet title actions to the intertidal zone at Moody Beach are not barred, a fortiori, the quiet title actions to the upland are not barred. In reviewing an order of the trial court granting a motion to dismiss, we consider all well-pleaded material allegations of the complaint as admitted. Culbert v. Sampson's Supermarkets Inc., 444 A.2d 433, 434 (Me.1982). The plaintiffs have alleged that they are vested with title in fee simple absolute to the upland at Moody Beach, clear of any claim of the public. There is no allegation that the State claims any interest in the upland. In the absence of such a showing the doctrine of sovereign immunity is simply irrelevant because the State is not a real party in interest in its sovereign capacity or otherwise. See Cushing v. Cohen, 420 A.2d 919, 923 (Me.1980) (We conclude ... that the real party in interest in this case is the State of Maine as sovereign....). On remand the defendants may by proof at trial establish the public right, if any, to use the upland, and the scope of the public right to use the intertidal zone. See Augusta Country Club, 477 A.2d at 1128-30 (discussing common methods of proving that the public at large has acquired a non-possessory interest in land). The alternative to our vacating the order granting the motion to dismiss Counts I and II would be to permit any State agency at its whim to block any quiet title action, whether in the intertidal zone, on the upland or elsewhere, by asserting an unproven interest. Such an approach is illogical because it assumes the meritsthe existence of the State's interestin order to avoid litigating the merits. Moreover, such a result would represent a radical assault on the stability of title to real property within this State and the availability of legal remedies to defend it. Cushing v. Cohen, 420 A.2d 919 (Me. 1980), relied on by the State and Town, is not to the contrary. In Cushing the State held the fee title to the lands in question and had granted cutting rights on them. See id. at 921. The State held the land as trustee for the public, and both the title and the trustee relationship were apparent on the basis of existing law. See id. at 923; see also State v. Mullen, 97 Me. 331, 335, 54 A. 841, 843 (1903). Thus, in Cushing, the State was clearly the real party in interest based on its title ownership, its clearly established trustee status, and its role as grantor of the interests in question. 420 A.2d at 923. A judgment rendered in its absence could not have been adequate and would have been highly prejudicial to the State. For these reasons the State was an indispensable party in Cushing, but is not here. [19] We hold therefore that the Superior Court erred in dismissing Counts I and II. While the State is not an indispensable party in the instant case, we see no reason to prevent the Attorney General's remaining in the case to represent the public interest in Moody Beach. We recognize that the Attorney General, as the chief law officer of the State, has the power and duty to institute, conduct and maintain such actions and proceedings as he deems necessary for the protection of public rights and to defend against any action that might invidiously interfere with the same. In re Estate of Thompson, 414 A.2d 881, 890 (Me.1980); see also Lund ex rel. Wilbur v. Pratt, 308 A.2d 554, 558 (Me.1973). The quieting of title at Moody Beach will affect the rights of the public at that beach and may through the persuasive authority of that decision affect public rights at other Maine beaches. Although neither the Colonial Ordinance nor the allegations of the parties disclose any direct interest of the State in the intertidal zone or the upland at Moody Beach requiring it to be a party to this action, the State acting through the Attorney General may decide that the public rights will be more effectively protected through its continued direct intervention than in its absence. [20] See M.R.Civ.P. 20(a), 24(b). Accordingly, the entry is: Judgment vacated. Remanded for further proceedings consistent with the opinion herein. All concurring.