Court Opinion

ID: 9484550
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-05 09:56:54.992451+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:50:18.794061
License: Public Domain

BATCHELDER, Circuit Judge,
dissenting.
I.
In Ohio, the surface rights and the mineral rights to a given tract of land may be conveyed separately. Gill v. Fletcher, 74 Ohio St. 295, 302, 78 N.E. 433 (1906). However, the Ohio Supreme Court has held1 that “[t]he right to strip mine for coal is not implicit in the ownership of a severed, mineral estate” and that the inclusion of “language peculiarly applicable to deep mining techniques” in a deed “conveying] the right to use the surface incident to mining coal” does not, without more, allow the grantee to strip mine the coal. Skivolocki v. East Ohio Gas Co., 38 Ohio St.2d 244, 67 O.O.2d 321, 313 N.E.2d 374 (1974). The Court has also held that the surface owner has “[t]he right of subjacent support of the surface in its natural state” and that the mineral estate holder is strictly liable for damage to the surface; for this reason,
[a] sale of all the coal under a tract of land is not, in terms or by necessary implication, a release of the right to surface support, but such waiver must appear by express grant, or the instrument conveying the estate clearly import such release.
Ohio Collieries Co. v. Cocke, 107 Ohio St. 238, 140 N.E. 356 (1923). See also Burgner v. Humphrey, 41 Ohio St. 340 (1884) (in absence of clear waiver of subjacent support, mineral estate lessee required to “leav[e] support sufficient to maintain the surface in its natural state”). In keeping with this well-*1003settled law, the Skivolocki Court stated that “strip mining is totally incompatible with the enjoyment of a surface estate,” and for this reason “a heavy burden rests upon the party seeking to demonstrate that such a right exists.” Skivolocki, 813 N.E.2d at 378.
In my estimation, none of the deeds put forth by Belville contains either the requisite express release or waiver of the right to subjacent support of the surface estate, or language specifically and unambiguously reserving to the grantors the right to strip mine coal or other minerals. I therefore am able to join only in the court’s conclusion that the Culbertson deeds do not permit strip mining (although I disagree with some of the factors the court considered in reaching that conclusion, as I shall presently explain) and in Part III of the court’s opinion, regarding the prerogative of the Office of Surface Mining to reconsider and reverse its own decisions regarding valid existing rights.
II.
1. The Culbertson deeds.
The Culbertson deeds each contain an identical reservation clause, “[rjeserving to the Grantor, his executors, heirs, administrators, and assigns, the right to prospect for, mine, remove and/or produce coal, oil [and] gas----” Under Ohio law, where such a reservation is made, “a covenant is implied on the part of the person who is to work the mines that he will so conduct his operations as to leave sufficient support for the surface.” East Ohio Gas Co. v. James Bros. Coal Co., 85 N.E.2d 816, 818-19 (Ct. Common Pleas Ohio 1948) (citing, inter alia, Burgner and Cocke). As the Skivolocki court recognized, shaft or “deep” mining disrupts the surface estate, to be sure, see 313 N.E.2d at 376, but “strip mining is totally incompatible with the enjoyment of a surface estate,” id. at 378 (emphasis added). Thus, where a deed conveys the surface estate, and simply reserves a “right to mine coal,” one must assume that the parties anticipate only deep mining.2 Such is the case with regard to the Culbertson deeds;
The majority, however, goes on to examine a series of subsequent paragraphs in the Culbertson deeds, noting that they “contain language ‘peculiarly applicable to deep mining techniques.’ ” Op. at 993-94. The three paragraphs of interest to the court provide that the grantee is to take
all reasonable and usual precautions ... for the support of the surface ... and to this end tunnels, shafts, and other workings will be subject to inspection by the Forest Officer in charge and by mine inspectors of the United States.
In prospecting for, and in mining or removing said coal, oil and gas and in manufacturing the products thereof, only so much of the surface as is reasonably necessary for the purpose, shall be used.
All mining operators shall in all future developments make reasonable provision for the disposal of tailings, dumpage and other deleterious material....
These provisions do mention deep mining techniques. For the majority, this language leaves “no room for doubt” that the Culbertson deeds did not permit strip mining. However, as I shall discuss at greater length in the context of the next set of deeds, in which the court did find rights to strip mine, I think the court errs in looking to this language of limitation to find words enunciating an unambiguous intent on the part of the grantors to reserve rights to strip mine and convey a surface interest that is subject to complete destruction at their will.
2. The Bauer, Simmering, and Jenkins3 Deeds.
These deeds reserve to the grantors “the right to prospect for and mine by means *1004other than hydraulic, which is prohibited, manufacture and remove coal, oil, gas brine, clays and shales of Ohio.” The majority notes the compelling appearance of the words “clays and shales of Ohio” in what is properly considered the granting clause, and observes that clays and shales may only be removed through strip mining. Looking at the rest of the deed, which sets out limits on the exercise of the reserved mineral rights, the court discovers language typically associated with strip mining, and one mention of strip mining itself. The court also notes that in the 1950s, the Forest Service issued strip mining permits to the mineral owners of these tracts; under the doctrine of “practical construction,” where the Government has so acquiesced in strip mining on its property, the Secretary may not now be heard to deny that the mineral estates include “valid existing rights” to strip mine.
A. Deep mining versus strip mining.
As quoted above, Skivolocki held that
[a] deed which severs a mineral estate from a surface estate, and which conveys the right to use the surface incident to mining coal, in language peculiarly applicable to deep mining techniques, does not grant the right to remove coal by strip mining methods.
313 N.E.2d at 375. I believe the court makes two mistakes of logic in applying this case, and its predecessor, Cocke, which held that only an express waiver of subjacent support permits enjoyment of mineral rights while escaping strict liability for damage done to the surface. 107 Ohio St. at 238, 252-54, 140 N.E. 356.
First, the court implicitly holds that where a deed includes language “peculiarly applicable” to strip mining techniques, then the parties probably intended the owner of the mineral rights to be able to extract the deposits by surface mining. See Op. at 995-96. In so holding, the court improperly argues that the converse follows from the premise. As I discussed above, where a deed conveys or reserves a generalized mineral right separate from the surface estate, the presumed method of extraction must be deep mining, regardless of whether the parties specified that deep mining techniques be used.4 Deep mining disrupts the surface estate to some degree, but it may be done with care such that tunnel collapse, gas explosions and the like do not partially or entirely destroy the surface estate; nonetheless, the miner remains strictly liable to the surface owner for any such damage. Hence the holdings in Ohio Collieries v. Cocke, which arise from the maxim that each owner of the mineral and surface estates “must use his own, as not to injure the property of the other.” Burgner, 41 Ohio St. at 352 (quoted in Cocke, 107 Ohio St. at 254, 140 N.E. 356). See also Stewart v. Chernicky, 439 Pa. 43, 266 A.2d 259, 264-65 n. 9 (1970) (followed by Skivo-locki) (analogizing surface estate to servient estate in an easement, and noting that “[t]he owner of the dominant estate may not exercise rights granted to it without regard to the rights of the servient owner.”). As the Ski-volocki court recognized, mineral rights to be enjoyed by strip mining cannot coexist with a *1005surface estate, since the surface estate may in essence be revoked at the whim of the mineral owner.
The majority seems to denigrate the Burg-ner and Cocke cases, despite the fact that they begat Skivolocki, because they “did not involve the assertion of a right to strip mine.” Op. at 993. But, as I have noted, the concerns for property rights of the surface estate owner giving rise to the earlier cases are greater, not less, in the context of an assertion of strip mining rights, as I think Skivo-locki itself illustrates. The requirements that the parties unambiguously and unmistakably intend to permit strip mining, and that the grantee of the surface estate intend to waive his right to subjacent support and thus leave his enjoyment of the surface subject to subsequent destruction, must, in my estimation, be viewed narrowly, with the assumption being that a reservation or conveyance of a mineral estate does not automatically render the surface estate and the rights to enjoy it inferior.5 See Peabody Coal Co. v. Erwin, 453 F.2d 398, 399 (6th Cir.1971) (per curiam) (“[T]he deed ... does not indicate the intention of the parties that the mineral owner bought the right to destroy the surface, or that it was intended that the mineral owner’s rights to use the surface would be superior to any competing right of the surface owner.’ ”). See also Smith v. Moore, 172 Colo. 440, 474 P.2d 794, 796 (1970) (where deed contains no express waiver of right to subjacent support by surface estate owner, to permit holder of reserved mineral rights to strip mine “would in effect be holding that the grantor retained everything he granted by his deed, and that the grantee received nothing”). Thus, Skivolocki cannot be interpreted to mean that the appearance in a deed of “language unique to strip mining techniques” in and of itself implies that strip mining was intended, and, more importantly, that the surface owner has completely waived his right to enjoyment of that estate.
B. The parties’ practical construction of the deeds.
I turn next to the majority’s reliance on the permits to strip mine issued by the Forest Service many years prior to the enactment of SMRCA. I think that the issuance of a permit to strip mine and recognition of an unlimited right to strip mine, thereby depriving the United States of its entire surface estate, are two different things for our purposes. Without a doubt, the Government may waive its rights to subjacent support and permit unlimited strip mining on any piece of land it owns, regardless of whether the relevant deed reserved strip mining rights. However, these particular permits were limited in scope,6 they are no longer in *1006effect, and one would suspect that some coal remains in the ground, since the permits allowed mining only in specified areas. The law may bind parties to a mineral rights conveyance who acquiesce to the use of certain mining methods, in the absence of a contract provision permitting those methods, or even where the deed prohibits those methods, particularly where the parties’ course of conduct is consistent over time. See New York Coal Co. v. New Pittsburgh Coal Co., 86 Ohio St. 140, 99 N.E. 198 (1912). An express waiver of a right to the use of a specific part of the surface estate, made for a limited duration, as was the case here, however, certainly cannot be considered a permanent waiver of rights to the entire surface estate.
C. Deriving intent from mandatory deed clauses.
Third, the court observes in the Bauer and Simmering deeds’ language that the parties “clearly contemplate[d] the possibility that exercise of the [mineral rights] will be accomplished by surface mining techniques.” Op. at 996. Besides the mention of hydraulic mining, the court notes that at the time the deeds were executed (the early 1940s) strip mining was on the rise, and that the regulatory language in the deeds “was not focused on underground mining, [but] included a specific reference to ‘stripping.’ ” Id.
The problem is this: Federal regulations promulgated by the Secretary of Agriculture required that all such deeds incorporate this language.7 After the advent of the Weeks Act in 1911, every deed conveying land to the United States and reserving mineral rights to the grantors incorporated the same provisions, essentially generally applicable regulations on the exercise of the reserved mineral rights. Recall that the majority explained that the regulations incorporated into the Culbertson deed contained “language ‘peculiarly applicable to deep mining techniques,’ ” Op. at 993-94; the court presumed that the general reservation of rights did not intend to encompass strip mining. The regulations had evolved by 1942, no doubt to reflect that “strip mining was well on its way to becoming the predominant method of extracting coal from the ground in Ohio” and elsewhere. Op. at 996. Hence, we find language applicable to strip mining in the regulatory clauses of the Bauer and Simmering deeds.
While the law of Ohio, reflecting the common law, requires a court to examine the “four corners” of a conveyance to determine the intent of the parties, Hinman v. Barnes, 146 Ohio St. 497, 32 O.O. 564, 570, 66 N.E.2d 911, 916 (1946) and while these regulations are technically part and parcel of the deed, a court cannot properly derive from this regulatory language an intent to reserve or convey any particular rights. In the context of these deeds, the regulations at best constitute conditions or limitations on the grantor’s general reservation of mineral rights.8 A limitation or condition only exists in reference to an affirmative conveyance; where the terms of a reservation are in “seeming repugnance to the granting clause,” the granting clause controls, and the limiting clause “ ‘has no validity or effect whatever.’ ” Johnson v. Darling, 32 O.C.A. 113, 118 (Ohio App.1921) (quoting Ball v. Foreman, 37 Ohio St. 132, 141 (1881)). Therefore, one cannot infer from the provision of a condition or limitation the general right it purports to delimit if the general right is not itself defined independently. And if there be any *1007doubt as to the interest the grantor has purportedly reserved to himself, “an exception or reservation in a conveyance is construed in favor of the grantee rather than of the grantor,” since the deed reflects the words of the grantor. Pure Oil Co. v. Kindall, 116 Ohio St. 188, 156 N.E. 119 (1927) (quoted in Campbell v. Johnson, 1993 WL 146516 (May 5, 1993)). Importantly, “a reservation in behalf of the grantor will not be enlarged beyond the fair and natural import of the language used.” Wolf v. Roberts, 30 Ohio Op. 499, 42 Ohio Law Abs. 449, 451 (1945) (quoted in Campbell, 1993 WL 146516).
Hence, I believe it improper to look to language that is present in the deed only by virtue of government edict to illuminate the intention of the parties. If we do so, then we today hold that all deeds conveying Ohio land to the Government now incorporated in the National Forests which reserve general mineral rights to the grantors, but contain neither explicit waivers of subjacent support nor explicit reservations of strip mining rights in their granting clauses, permit unlimited strip mining by the mineral rights owners. Far from “ascertainfing] the true intent of the parties to the conveyance, as evidenced by the language they used,” we will, in many if not most cases be ignoring the intention of the parties, by looking not at language the parties used, but at language the Government made them use, this mandatory language ironically meant to regulate and limit the exercise of reserved mining rights.
D. Prohibition of hydraulic mining.
Fourth, I can give no weight to the Simmering and Bauer deeds’ prohibition of hydraulic mining. The Weeks Act prohibited hydraulic mining and, pursuant to Federal regulation, this prohibition appears in the deeds, as do the other limitations already discussed. See, for example, United States v. Stearns Co., 595 F.Supp. 808, 810 (E.D.Ky. 1984), aff'd, 816 F.2d 279. As with the other regulations, this mandatory provision should not be considered to reflect any particular intent of the parties.
III.
There is no dispute that each of the grantors intended to convey land to the Federal Government for inclusion in the National Forests.9 Neither do the parties dispute that the grantors reserved certain mineral rights in making these conveyances. The question is whether the parties intended both to convey to the Government the surface estate subject to a waiver of the right to enjoy that very estate, and to reserve to the grantors the right to exploit their mineral estates by means of destroying the surface. The parties could certainly agree in writing to such a conveyance, but the law requires that their intentions be set out clearly in writing, or if the deed be unclear, that the circumstances of the execution of the deed unmistakably show that the parties intended such a result. I think that none of these deeds supports Belville’s claim to strip mining rights, and for that reason, I respectfully dissent.

. Only the syllabus preceding an opinion of the Ohio Supreme Court is considered binding law; the opinion itself has only the persuasive force of dicta. State v. Wilson, 58 Ohio St.2d 52, 60, 12 O.O.3d 51, 388 N.E.2d 745 (1979); Cassidy v. Glossip, 12 Ohio St.2d 17, 41 O.O.2d 153, 231 N.E.2d 64 (1967).

. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, in a decision followed by the Ohio Supreme Court in Skivo-locki, concluded similarly, using much the same reasoning. Stewart v. Chernicky, 439 Pa. 43, 266 A.2d 259, 264 (1970).

. I include the Jenkins deed in this discussion, since I agree with the majority that it in essence contains the same terms as do the Bauer and Simmering deeds. Inasmuch as I think the Jenkins deed does not reserve the right to strip mine, I need not address the issue of the five year *1004extension of the mineral rights’ expiration date in the context of this appeal.

. The majority also considers that by the 1950s, strip mining was the predominant method of mining in Ohio, and concludes that deeds executed during and after that time most likely presumed that the owners of mineral rights would use strip mining to enjoy their estates. Skivo-locki took this into consideration as well, albeit by pointing out that a deed executed in 1901 certainly did not anticipate the advent of strip mining and therefore the parties to it cannot be thought to have intended to subjugate the surface estate to the mineral estate. I have my doubts as to whether this dicta means that once strip mining was popular, then even in the absence of a clear indication of intent to waive the surface rights, deeds conveying general mineral rights implicitly permitted strip mining. The fact remains, as Skivolocki unequivocally states, that strip mining is "totally incompatible with the enjoyment of a surface estate.” 313 N.E.2d at 378. I recognize that courts, including this Circuit, do consider whether strip mining was in use or "technologically feasible” at the time a deed was executed in illuminating the intent of the parties to permit such techniques. United States v. Stearns Coal & Lumber Co., 816 F.2d 279, 283 (6th Cir.1987). Such evidence, however, is extrinsic evidence properly considered only where the deed itself is ambiguous. See Kelly v. Marsh, 1989 WL 18869 (citing Long v. Olinger, 16 Ohio Law Abs. 182 (1933)).

. Under the common law, the mineral estate was dominant over the surface estate, giving the mineral rights owner the right to use "so much of the surface as is reasonably necessary” to explore for and extract the minerals, as well the right of access over the surface estate for these purposes. 6 Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Foundation, American Law of Mining § 200.-02[l][b][i] (Cheryl Outerbridge, ed., 2d ed. 1992). However, the common law also forbade the dominant estate owner from exercising his rights "without regard to the rights of the servient owner,” and depriving the subservient estate owner his right to enjoy the surface by destroying or unreasonably harming it. Stewart, 266 A.2d at 264-65 n. 9. As this discussion indicates, the late nineteenth- and twentieth-century cases have moved away from the idea that the mineral estate is dominant, toward an equality of interests, for example by requiring the mineral owner to maintain the subjacent support of the surface. American Law of Mining, supra § 200.02[l][b][i],

. And, perhaps more importantly, these permits were issued long before the Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act became law, which imposed strict regulations on strip mining, among them the requirement that Federal or Federally-approved state permits be obtained pri- or to the commencement or continuation of any surface mining. 30 U.S.C. §§ 1252, 1256. As the majority notes, SMCRA banned surface mining in the National Forests outright, 30 U.S.C. § 1272(e), subject to those "valid existing rights" in existence on August 3, 1977. Since SMCRA recognizes the validity of preexisting permits only in one minor context, that of mining conducted on "prime farmland,” 30 U.S.C. § 1260(d), to derive unlimited strip mining rights by implication from permits issued twenty years prior to the advent of SMCRA does violence to the statutory scheme. I fear the majority has not only "grandfathered” all preexisting permits, but has, as discussed, read a general waiver of the surface estate into a limited waiver granted by permit, which now may be derived even from expired permits. I believe such unlimited rights to be neither "valid” nor "existing.”

. In 1911, Congress enacted 36 Stat. 961, under which the Secretary of Agriculture promulgated a series of regulations which were to be appended to, and incorporated in, any conveyance of land to the United States which reserved mineral rights to the grantors. See Stearns Coal and Lumber, 816 F.2d at 283. Indeed, in the conveyances discussed here, the government-printed page listing the regulations was simply appended to each deed.

. Note the preliminary language of the regulation as it appears on the government-printed page appended to the deeds:'
Whoever begins such [mining] operations must, on demand, exhibit to the Forest Officer in charge satisfactory evidence of authority from the grantor so to do, and must comply with the following requirements^]
As might be expected, the regulations require that the right to mine be specifically reserved in its entirety in the conveyance, and that such rights do not somehow derive from the regulations themselves, which only limit the means by which such rights may be enjoyed.

. Interestingly, the Federal Government established the National Forests and acquired forest land for them for the purpose of "timber production and the protection of navigable waters and environs." Stearns, 595 F.Supp. at 811; see also 1 American Law of Mining § 4.12. They were not originally intended for recreational public use. Id.