Opinion ID: 1921823
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: CLASSIFICATION UNDER L. 1940, c. 5, AS AMENDED

Text: The fourth question involved in these appeals is whether the Company's operations on Atlantic Avenue in Atlantic City constitute it a street railway corporation using or occupying the public streets, highways, roads or other public places subject to franchise and gross receipts tax under L. 1940, c. 5, sec. 6, and L. 1940, c. 5, sec. 6 as amended L. 1948, c. 217, sec. 1, supra. In 1948, 1949 and 1950 the tax years involved in these appeals the statutory definitions included the following: (g) `Public street, highway, road or other public place' includes any street, highway, road or other public place which is open and used by the public, even though the same has not been formally accepted as a public street, highway, road, or other public place.  (Emphasis supplied.) (See L. 1940, c. 5, sec. 2, as amended L. 1941, c. 21, p. 43, sec. 1, N.J.S.A. 54:31-46) In effect, the Company's claim is that by virtue of the fact (as it alleges) that it does not operate any portion of its lines in a public street or public place it is exempt from taxation under this statute, L. 1940, c. 5, as amended. Viewed in that respect the Company must carry the burden of proving the facts to support its contention. Clifton v. State Board of Tax Appeals, 136 N.J.L. 213, 216 ( E. & A. 1947); Borough of Edgewater v. Connoil Corp., 4 N.J. Super. 338, 342 ( App. Div. 1949). And further, we have held that The settled rule is that there is a presumption that an assessment made by the proper authority is correct and the burden of proof is on the taxpayer to show otherwise. Aetna Life Insurance Co. v. City of Newark, supra, (10 N.J., at p. 105); D., L. & W.R. Co. v. City of Hoboken, supra (10 N.J., at p. 426). The respondent argues that the Division of Tax Appeals correctly determined that the Company had failed to carry the burden of proof. We so determine. The Company introduced no pertinent evidence, and the evidence introduced by the respondent supports the assessment. There is no evidence in the record to support a claim by the Company that its predecessors in title owned the fee to the Company's roadbed in Atlantic Avenue, for any width (24.3 feet wide or otherwise) prior to the filing of the agreement and map of dedication dated April 15, 1853, filed and recorded in the county clerk's office on May 23, 1854. The evidence shows that this agreement of April 15, 1853 was signed and acknowledged by various parties, including the Camden and Atlantic Land Company, a New Jersey corporation which was incorporated about March 10, 1853 by the principal incorporators of the Camden and Atlantic Railroad Company (a New Jersey corporation chartered March 19, 1852). With the exception of the Land Company which at that time held no legal title to the premises in question, the grantors in said agreement appear to have been former owners of the fee of the lands covered thereby. They had previously conveyed all their right, title and interest in a substantial portion of the same to one Isaac Waterman, who received the title in trust for the Land Company. Deeds vesting title in Waterman were dated February 10, 1853 and were recorded March 2, 1853. Waterman and his wife by deed dated September 28, 1854, recorded October 2, 1854 in which deed it was recited that Waterman had received title in trust for the Land Company, conveyed the fee to the Land Company. It is apparent from these and other items in the record that the grantors in the April 1853 deed of dedication at the time thereof had previously conveyed a substantial portion of the subject lands to Waterman and therefore could not dedicate any portion thereof to public or railroad use. But the Land Company, the equitable owner, joined in the deed. It has been held in other jurisdictions that an equitable owner may be bound by the dedication under such circumstances. 2 Thompson on Real Property ( Perm. ed., 1939), sec. 484, p. 50; Frye v. King County, 151 Wash. 179, 275 P. 547, 62 A.L.R. 476, 478 ( Sup. Ct. 1929). Annotations, 62 A.L.R. 480 et seq. That the map constituted a dedication and was accepted as such by the City of Atlantic City has been judicially determined. The former Supreme Court in State, Felix, Pros., v. Atlantic City, 34 N.J.L. 99, 104-105 ( Sup. Ct. 1869) held: December 20th, 1852, a map or plot of Atlantic City was made by the Camden and Atlantic Land Company, and other owners of lands within the boundaries, and by agreement between the parties, dated April 15, 1853, was formally adopted, and a dedication of the streets and alleys thus laid down was made for public use. This map and agreement were recorded in the Clerk's office of Atlantic county, May 23d, 1854. March 3d, 1854, Atlantic City was incorporated according to the boundaries of said map. In describing these boundaries, Atlantic street is expressly named as one of the streets of said city, and a line run parallel with its course. These facts settle the question of the recognition by municipal authority of the dedication of this street or avenue, concerning which much was said on the argument of the cause. The railroad, the land association, and the laying out and incorporating a city for a watering place, were all parts of a scheme directed by the same persons to the same ends. All the acts done in furtherance of these objects were concurrent and consistent. There is no evidence in this cause of exclusive right or ownership in the railroad company to the part of Atlantic avenue in controversy. The dedication of the street to public use antedates the occupation and use by the railroad company at this point. All the circumstances show that there is no conflict of right or authority between the company and the city, and that the owner of the land at that time assented to the use of the street by the public and by the railroad company. Whatever question there might be as to the right of exclusive use by the railroad company of a public highway by legislative and municipal authority, without the consent of the owner of the fee, or compensation made to him, there can be no question that there may be a concurrent use of a public highway by the consent and license of all the parties in interest. Morris & Essex Railroad v. City of Newark, 2 Stockt. 352, Williams v. New York Central Railroad, 18 N.Y. 97; 1 Redfield on Railways 162. Atlantic avenue is therefore a public street within the terms of the charter; and the common council could require it to be graded, curbed and graveled as such by ordinance. The evidence in the record of the appeals before us verifies the conclusions expressed in the Felix case, supra. The Company admits that the Camden and Atlantic Land Company, between October 12, 1854 and May 17, 1877, made 33 conveyances along Atlantic Avenue by descriptions related to a designated map. (The testimony of Mr. Jay C. Kline, a title expert, was that there were hundreds of conveyances, but only 33 were introduced in evidence.) It is a legitimate inference to be drawn from the evidence adduced that the map adverted to was that filed May 23, 1854, ante. There having been sales of lots of land along Atlantic Avenue upon descriptions reciting along Atlantic Avenue or along either side of Atlantic Avenue, and made with reference to that map, the street was an existing highway dedicated as such under the principles laid down in Salter v. Jonas, 39 N.J.L. 469, 471-474 ( E. & A. 1877) and Brill v. Eastern New Jersey Power Co., 111 N.J.L. 224-225 ( E. & A. 1933), and the grantees' titles extended to the middle of the street. The Company in these appeals relies on evidence that was apparently not before the former Supreme Court in the Felix case, supra, coupled with the map of dedication above adverted to. The sources of its claims are an agreement entered into by the original land owners with the Camden and Atlantic Railroad Company, dated June 21, 1852, but not recorded until February 7, 1890, and the original survey of the Camden and Atlantic Railroad which was filed on November 9, 1852. Giving the June 21, 1852 agreement full weight as asserted by the Company, it was no more than an agreement to give consent in the future. And the agreement and map of dedication recorded in May 1854 contained no reservation of any rights in the fee of Atlantic Avenue, although the map shows along the center of Atlantic Avenue a line marked center line railroad. There is clearly no proof that any reservation of the fee was intended and we need not determine the construction of the language (consent to the laying out of any road and walks) used in the June 21, 1852 agreement, i.e., whether the consent to be given thereunder was for railroad purposes or merely for dedication of streets and walks. The Company, upon the basis of the alleged consent agreement and map of dedication, ante, seeks to invoke the doctrine of Ayres v. Pennsylvania R.R. Co., 52 N.J.L. 405, 409-412 ( E. & A. 1890). The Ayres case, supra, holds that the filing of a railroad survey does not preclude the owners from effecting complete dedication, but also holds that where there is evidence that the dedication was subject to the railroad's right to acquire the title to or the use of a strip of land covered by the dedication the use as a public highway is subsidiary and will not operate on the land so granted until the railroad use is abandoned. In the Ayres case, supra, the indication of a railroad line in the center of the street was held to be sufficient evidence of the railroad's right subsequently to acquire the use of the strip, as against the public, from the original grantor even where he had conveyed away his title to the fee. In the present case the Company contends that its predecessor in title acquired such rights by virtue of several deeds executed by original owners of the fee (or their heirs) and by the Camden and Atlantic Land Company, dated in 1875 (but not recorded until 1885). Supporting proofs with respect to title and tracing the Company's (appellant's) ownership or easement right from 1852 to the time of the assessment in this case are not complete and are not demonstrated with exactness. Further, it is admitted by the Company that the Atlantic City portion of Atlantic Avenue, the only portion in question in this case, has long been paved for its whole width, and in use by the public even where the tracks of the Company are located. Even if the proofs were sufficient to show that the Company or its predecessors acquired the fee to its roadbed in that portion of Atlantic Avenue, or a right to exclusive use of the same paramount to the public right under the Ayres case, supra, the long continued public user of the whole width of the avenue, of which there is evidence in this case, is in itself proof of abandonment to the public even though the public authorities do not work the road. Dickinson v. D., L. & W.R.R. Co., 87 N.J.L. 264, 265-266 ( E. & A. 1915); Riverside v. Pennsylvania Railroad Co., 74 N.J.L. 476, 479 ( E. & A. 1907). Cf. Township of Parsippany-Troy Hills v. Bowman, 3 N.J. 97, 103-104 (1949). We are persuaded that upon the whole of the evidence in this case, the peaks of which are hereinabove discussed, the Company has failed to carry the burden of proof of its claims, and that for the purposes of its tax appeals for 1948, 1949 and 1950 the evidence in the record shows that Atlantic Avenue in Atlantic City is a public street or public place, for its entire width along the 3.043 miles in question.