Court Opinion

ID: 9537590
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 07:20:14.413062+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:56:49.217865
License: Public Domain

RABINOWITZ, Chief Justice,
dissenting in part.
I find that I am unable to agree with the court’s conclusion that the State of Alaska or the Municipality of Anchorage is entitled to claim highway easements in excess of those reserved when the parcels in question were conveyed by patent from the federal government. Before discussing the grounds for my disagreement with the court’s ruling, however, I believe that it will be useful to set forth what I consider to be the significant facts.
The principal question in this appeal is whether the state1 must compensate three landowners for portions of their parcels taken to widen existing roads. The landowners — Theodore and Claire Pease, Richard Boysen, and a limited partnership called Hansen Associates — are the successors in interest to persons who originally acquired the parcels by patent from the federal government. The federal government expressly reserved highway easements or rights-of-way in the Pease and Boysen patents; there were no easements or rights-of-way reserved in the Hansen patent. In each case the state claims a highway easement greater than that reserved in the patent, resting its claims on various now-repealed federal directives which provided arguably that the easements claimed by the state should have been expressly reserved when the parcels were conveyed by patent.2
*728In my view, the state’s reliance upon undisclosed easements, decades after the lands were patented,3 is foreclosed by both federal and state statutes of limitations governing suits to set aside patents.4 In addition, I think the landowners are entitled to the protection of Alaska’s recording act.5 Thus, I do not agree with the court’s ruling that the state need not compensate the landowners for taking easements which were not expressly reserved in the patents.6
In my view, the dispositive legal issue in this appeal should be framed as follows: if the federal government mistakenly issues a patent which purports to convey clear title to lands which should have been withheld for highway easements, is there a time after which the patent may not be challenged notwithstanding the mistake? Because Congress has supplied the answer to this dispositive question in the form of a statute of limitations applicable to suits challenging the validity of patents, I think it is unnecessary to address the array of statutes, Public Land Orders, and Departmental Orders marshalled by the state in defense of the easements that it claims.
Forty-three U.S.C. § 1166 provides that “[sjuits by the United States to vacate and annul any patent shall only be brought within six years after the date of the issuance of such patents.”7 This statute of *729limitations was enacted because of “the insecurity and loss of confidence of the public in the integrity and value of patent title to public lands, which had been occasioned by conflicting claims ... which had resulted in many suits being commenced to cancel patents.” United States v. Whited & Wheless, Ltd., 246 U.S. 552, 562, 38 S.Ct. 367, 368, 62 L.Ed. 879, 882 (1918). The statute presupposes that the federal government might err and issue a patent to previously reserved lands. As the Supreme Court has explained, “[i]f the act were confined to valid patents it would be almost or quite without use.” United States v. Chandler-Dunbar Water Power Co., 209 U.S. 447, 450, 28 S.Ct. 579, 580, 52 L.Ed. 881, 887 (1908). The well-settled rule is that the running of the statute of limitations “makes the title of the patentee good as against the grantor, the United States.” United States v. Eaton Shale Co., 433 F.Supp. 1256, 1269 (D.Colo.1977). If the landowners’ patent titles are good as against the original grantor, the United States, then their titles are good as against the state, which acquired its interests, if any, in the patented lands in 1959 by quitclaim deed from the federal government. In my view the effect of the six-year statute of limitations is to validate a mistakenly issued patent after the limitations period has expired.8 Thus, I would *730hold that the federal statute of limitations, 43 U.S.C. § 1166, bars the state’s claim to undisclosed easements.9
As an independent basis for ruling that the landowners’ parcels are free of the easements claimed by the state, I would hold further that the state’s claims are barred by AS 09.10.230, which provides in pertinent part:
No person may bring an action to set aside, cancel, annul, or otherwise affect a patent to lands issued by this state or the United States, or to compel a person claiming or holding under a patent to convey the lands described in the patent or a portion of them to the plaintiff in the action, or to hold the lands in trust for or to the use and benefit of the plaintiff, or on account of any matter, thing, or transaction which was had, done, suffered, or transpired before the date of the patent unless commenced within 10 years from the date of the patent.10
This statute, which clearly evinces the legislature’s intent that patents be considered conclusive evidence of the title they purport to convey after ten years from the date of issuance, has been the law of the territory and State of Alaska for the better part of a century. In my view it is appropriate to give effect to this long-standing state policy of promoting public confidence in the stability and marketability of patent titles.11
*731Finally, I do not agree with the court’s holding that Boysen and the Peases are charged with constructive notice of federal directives published in the Federal Register and thus are unable to claim bona fide purchaser status under Alaska’s recording act, AS 34.15.290.
Forty-four U.S.C. § 1507 provides that persons are charged with notice of documents filed for publication in the Federal Register “except in cases where notice by publication is insufficient in law.” Thus, the pertinent question is whether published notice of federal directives such as Public Land Orders is “insufficient in law” to bind Boysen and the Peases, who did not have actual knowledge of the published directives when they purchased their parcels.12
The answer to this question is supplied by federal law,13 and, as the court notes, there are a number of situations in which notice in the Federal Register is sufficient to bind persons who did not know of the publication. In my view, however, this appeal involves a situation in which notice by publication is “insufficient in law” within the meaning of 44 U.S.C. § 1507.
Our task is to determine whether Congress intended that the sufficiency of published notice of federal directives affecting Alaska real property is to be tested by looking to state law14 or by applying an independent body of federal common law designed to supplant the state’s conveyancing rules.15 Congress did not address this question when enacting the predecessor to 44 U.S.C. § 1507, but, in my view, had it done so it would not have concluded that lands whose private title began with a patent from the federal government should be subject to different conveyancing standards than neighboring parcels whose title originated elsewhere. I find it difficult to believe that that Congress could have intended to displace established conveyancing law in every state in the union and create a chaotic system in which each state is required to apply different standards to patented parcels than to parcels whose chain of title did not begin with a federal patent. In short, I think that the sufficiency of notice for purposes of 44 U.S.C. § 1507 should be determined by applying state law standards. Since the law of this state does not charge a grantee with notice of prepa-tent transactions and documents16 or of instruments not recorded in the chain of title,17 I would conclude that Boysen and the Peases did not have constructive notice of the easements claimed by the state and thus are protected by AS 34.15.290.

. Although the right of the Municipality of Anchorage to claim undisclosed easements is also at issue, I will refer only to the state’s rights, for convenience’s sake, as the legal issues are the same as to both the state and the municipality.

. The Pease patent reserved a right-of-way of unspecified location and width under the authority of 48 U.S.C. § 321d, and also reserved a separate 33-foot right-of-way along the south and east boundaries of the parcel. The Peases concede that the state is entitled to the 33-foot right-of-way, and the Alaska Right-of-Way Act of 1966, ch. 92, 1966 Temporary and Special Acts and Resolutions, requires the state to *728compensate the Peases if it uses a section 321d right-of-way notwithstanding the fact that the right-of-way was expressly reserved in the patent. In addition, section 138(b) of the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1970 provides an independent basis for concluding that the state may not claim a section 32 Id easement. That provision states:
Any right-of-way for roads, roadways, highways, tramways, trails, bridges, and appurtenant structures reserved by section 321(d) [sic] of title 48, United States Code (61 Stat. 418, 1947), not utilized by the United States or by the State or territory of Alaska prior to the date of enactment hereof, shall be and hereby is vacated and relinquished by the United States to the end and intent that such reservation shall merge with the fee and be forever extinguished.
Pub.L. No. 91-605, § 138(b), 1970 U.S.Code Cong. & Ad.News 2001, 2029 (uncodified). The state, however, claims yet another easement of fifty feet on the Pease parcel, which is seventeen feet greater than the easement to which the Peases agree the state is entitled. The state claims this fifty-foot easement pursuant to Public Land Orders 601 and 757 and Department Order 2665.
The Boysen patent reserved only a section 32Id right-of-way; once again, the state must compensate Boysen if it uses a section 321d right-of-way. The state, however, claims a separate 150-foot easement on the Boysen parcel under the authority of Public Land Order 1613 and Department Order 2665.
As to the Hansen parcel, which is subject to no reserved highway easements or rights-of-way, the state also claims a 150-foot easement under the authority of Public Land Order 1613 and Department Order 2665.

.The Hansen patent was issued on June 1, 1950; the Boysen patent, on May 15, 1952; the Pease patent, on October 4, 1955. The state did not claim the easements that it now seeks until the mid to late 1970’s.

. 43 U.S.C. § 1166; AS 09.10.230. I do not find it necessary to distinguish or consider the many Alaska cases dealing with the effect of various federal directives, because none of those cases have addressed the statutes of limitations issues.

. AS 34.15.290.

. The only federal directive upon which the state relies which was in effect when the Hansen parcel was patented is Public Land Order 601; the remaining directives were not promulgated until after the Hansen patent was issued and cannot, in my view, be applied to alter vested property interests without abridging rights secured by the federal and state constitutions. The withdrawals made by Public Land Order 601 were, however, subject to “valid existing rights,” and an entryman’s claim is a “valid existing right” which could not be adversely affected by Public Land Order 601. Since the Hansen parcel was entered prior to the promulgation of Public Land Order 601, that parcel is not subject to the withdrawal made by that directive.

. Admittedly the United States is not a party to this litigation, but this observation does not answer the question of the applicability of the federal statute of limitations. The state, which acquired its interests in federally-created highway easements from the federal government by quitclaim deed, could not have acquired greater rights than its grantor had; the state’s rights are merely derivative. A claim that would have been time-barred as to the United States was not revived, nor did the federal statute of limitations cease to run as to viable claims, when the United States transferred its rights to *729the state. Stated differently, a time-barred claim is not revived by assigning it to someone to whom the relevant statute of limitations is not applicable. See, e.g., Stanczyk v. Keefe, 384 F.2d 707, 708 (7th Cir.1967) (parents could not revive time-barred claim by assigning it to minor child, against whom statute of limitations did not run); Smith v. Copiah County, 232 Miss. 838, 100 So.2d 614, 616 (1958) (as-signee’s claim is barred if assignor’s rights are barred).
Inherent in my conclusion that 43 U.S.C. § 1166 is applicable is the view that a judicial ruling which declares that a portion of the landowners’ patented parcels must be conveyed without compensation to the state, in derogation of the patents themselves, is the functional equivalent of a ruling that portions of the patents be “vacated” or “annulled.”

. See United States v. Winona & St. Peter R.R. Co., 165 U.S. 463, 17 S.Ct. 368, 41 L.Ed. 789 (1897); United States v. Chandler-Dunbar Water Power Co., 209 U.S. 447, 28 S.Ct. 579, 52 L.Ed. 881 (1908). In Winona the Court explained:
Congress evidently recognized the fact that notwithstanding any error in certification or patent there might be rights which equitably deserved protection, and that it would not be fitting for the government to insist upon the letter of the law in disregard of such equitable rights. In the first place, it has distinctly recognized the fact that when there are no adverse individual rights, and only the claims of the government and of the present holder of the title to be considered, it is fitting that a time should come when no mere errors or irregularities on the part of the officers of the land department should be open for consideration. In other words, it has recognized that, as against itself in respect to these land transactions, it is right that there should be a statute of limitations; that when its proper officers, acting in the ordinary course of their duties, have conveyed away lands which belonged to the government, such conveyances should, atter the lapse of a prescribed time, be conclusive against the government, and this notwithstanding any errors, irregularities, or improper action of its officers therein.
165 U.S. at 475-76, 17 S.Ct. at 370-71, 41 L.Ed. at 795 (emphasis added).
Indeed, so strong is the federal policy of ensuring that federal patents convey unassailable title that the validity of even fraudulently-procured patents may not be challenged after the six-year statute of limitations has run. See, e.g., United States v. Whited & Wheless, Ltd., 246 U.S. 552, 38 S.Ct. 367, 62 L.Ed. 879 (1918). A patentee who procures a patent by fraud has good title after the six-year period has expired, although the statute of limitations does not begin to run until the fraud is discovered. Exploration Co. v. United States, 247 U.S. 435, 38 S.Ct. 571, 62 L.Ed. 1200 (1918).
In addition, the federal bona fide purchaser doctrine provides that the validity of an erroneously granted patent may not be challenged once the original patentee conveys the parcel to a bona fide purchaser. See, e.g., United States v. California & Oregon Land Co., 148 U.S. 31, 40-41, 13 S.Ct. 458, 461-462, 37 L.Ed. 354, 359-60 (1893); Colorado Coal & Iron Co. v. United States, 123 U.S. 307, 313, 8 S.Ct. 131, 133, 31 L.Ed. 182, 185 (1887). Bona fide purchase from a patentee is a perfect defense to a suit to set aside a patent. See, e.g., Wright-Blodgett Co. v. United States, 236 U.S. 397, 35 S.Ct. 339, 59 L.Ed. 637 (1915), which involved a patent obtained by fraud:
[T]he respect due a patent, the presumption that all the preceding steps required'by the law had been observed before its issue, and the immense importance of stability of titles dependent upon these instruments, demand that suit to cancel them should be sustained only by proof which produces conviction.... And, despite satisfactory proof of fraud in *730obtaining the patent, as the legal title has passed, bona fide purchase for value is a perfect defense.
Id. at 403, 35 S.Ct. at 341, 59 L.Ed. at 640 (citations omitted) (emphasis added).

.I find the authorities relied upon by the court, see ante n. 19, inapposite for two reasons. First, those authorities simply do not address the statute of limitations issue.
Second, many of those authorities involve situations in which, at the time the patent in question was issued, the patented lands had previously been conveyed to or reserved for some third party, such as a railroad or a state. In such situations courts have sometimes concluded that the prepatent interests prevailed over the patentees’ claims. In the case at hand, however, the state is not claiming, and cannot claim, that it acquired the easements or rights-of-way prior to the issuance of the patents in question and that the patents were therefore issued in derogation of the state’s rights. The claim is not that the federal government had conveyed away parts of the patented parcels to anyone prior to issuing the patents; rather, the gist of the claim is that the federal government mistakenly conveyed by patent, lands that it intended to keep for itself.
In Cramer v. United States, 261 U.S. 219, 67 L.Ed. 622, 43 S.Ct. 342, (1923), the Court made precisely this distinction. Cramer involved a suit brought by the United States to set aside a patent granted to a railroad covering lands occupied by Indians. The Court distinguished between suits brought by the government to cancel patents and revest title in itself and suits brought so that the parcels could be vested in third parties whose rights had accrued prior to patent. The Court noted that the six-year statute of limitations applies to the former kind of case, but not to the latter:
The suit is not barred by [now 43 U.S.C. § 1166], limiting the time within which suits may be brought by the United States to annul patents.
The object of that statute is to extinguish any right the government may have in the land which is the subject of the patent, not to foreclose claims of third parties. Here the purpose of the annulment was not to establish the right of the United States to the lands, but to remove a cloud upon the posses-sory rights of its wards. As stated by this court in United States v. Winona & St. Peter R.R. Co., 165 U.S. 463, 475 [17 S.Ct. 368, 370], 41 L.Ed. 789, 795, ... the statute was passed in recognition of “the fact that when there are no adverse individual rights, and only the claims of the government and of the present holder of the title to be considered, it is fitting that a time should come when no mere errors or irregularities on the part of the officers of the Land Department should be open for consideration.” After the lapse of the statutory period, the patent becomes conclusive against the government, but not as against claims and rights of others ....
Id. at 233-34, 43 S.Ct. at 346, 67 L.Ed. at 628 (emphasis in original). See also United States v. Krause, 92 F.Supp. 756, 766 (W.D.La.1950); Capron v. Van Horn, 258 P. 77 (Cal.1927).

. See Monroe v. California Yearly Meeting of Friends Church, 564 F.2d 304, 306 n. 2 (9th Cir.1977).

. Although the question of the applicability of AS 09.10.230 was not raised below, we have repeatedly stated that “[u]pon appeal, a correct decision of the superior court will be affirmed regardless of whether we agree with the reasons advanced.” Fireman's Fund Am. Ins. Cos. v. Gomes, 544 P.2d 1013, 1017 n. 12 (Alaska 1978); Carlson v. State, 598 P.2d 969, 973 (Alaska 1979); A & G Constr. Co. v. Reid Bros. Logging Co., 547 P.2d 1207, 1211 n. 1 (Alaska 1976).

. Under AS 34.15.290 Boysen and the Peases must prevail as bona fide purchasers unless they are charged with constructive notice of the existence of easements which were not recorded in their chains of title.
Our ruling in Hahn v. Alaska Title Guaranty Co., 557 P.2d 143 (Alaska 1976) does not dispose of this issue because the parties in Hahn did not argue, and we did not consider, whether a notice published in the Federal Register might be “insufficient in law.”

. See, e.g., Ritter v. Morton, 513 F.2d 942, 946 (9th Cir.1975) (per curiam), cert. denied, 423 U.S. 947, 96 S.Ct. 362, 46 L.Ed.2d 281 (1975); United States v. Boyd, 458 F.2d 1252, 1254 (6th Cir.1972).

. See, e.g., Reconstruction Finance Corp. v. Beaver County, 328 U.S. 204, 66 S.Ct. 992, 90 L.Ed. 1172 (1946). Congress is, of’course, free to adopt state rules as federal law. See generally P. Bator, P. Mishkin, D. Shapiro, & H. Wechsler, Hart and Wechsler’s The Federal Courts and the Federal System 470-71, 491-94 (2d ed. 1973). The classic éxample of such an incorporation of states’ legal doctrine into federal law is the Federal Tort Claims Act, under which the liability of the United States — a federal question — is determined by applying state substantive law. See 28 U.S.C. § 2674; see also, e.g., Otteson v. United States, 622 F.2d 516 (10th Cir.1980).

. See, e.g., Clearfield Trust Co. v. United States, 318 U.S. 363, 63 S.Ct. 573, 87 L.Ed. 838 (1943).

. See File v. State, 593 P.2d 268, 270 (Alaska 1979) (“patent is the highest evidence of title”).

. See Sabo v. Horvath, 559 P.2d 1038 (Alaska 1976).