Court Opinion

ID: 9586490
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:12:01.470473+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:31:58.534472
License: Public Domain

Deen, Judge,
dissenting. Under Section 1 of the Act of 1902, the State ceded ownership of the land under the non-navigable tidal waters to "the present owner of the adjacent land for all purposes, including among others the exclusive right to oysters, clams and other shellfish therein or thereon.” "The rule [of ejusdem generis] however, does not necessarily require that the general provision be limited in its scope to the identical things specifically named. Nor does it apply when the context manifests a contrary intention.” Black’s Law Dictionary, 4th Ed. Obviously "for all purposes” does not mean only the right to the oysters and other shellfish, simply because they are specifically named. It would not prevent the owner of the land under the water, for instance, from driving pilings, building a dock, and so on. The majority opinion construes "all purposes” to mean "all purposes except fishing,” but the word "including” may as easily be taken to mean an emphasis on a formerly disputed attribute of the water bed rather than an implied exclusion of another. At least, the question had never been raised in the Georgia appellate courts, the otherwise plain affirmative language had never been construed as meaning less than it said, and prosecutions under the statute were regularly being carried on in the courts of Chatham County and prosecuted to a successful conclusion based on the assumption that the ownership of the tidal bed included (as it generally does) the right to keep trespassers off the waters above it, whether they were fishing or not, on the theory that ownership extends up and down to a reasonable distance. (Cf. mineral rights and air rights cases). Under these circumstances, there should be a presumption in favor of the applicability of the law under the "for all purposes” provision until limited by court construction, in the same way that where a plaintiff in a malicious prosecution case is prosecuted under a statute which it develops was in fact unconstitutional, *333this has no bearing on the issue of probable cause because "every statute should be considered valid until a judicial determination to the contrary, and . . . the parties instituting the prosecution have a right to act on the assumption that it is valid.” 54 CJS 978, Malicious Prosecution, § 21; Birdsall v. Smith, 158 Mich. 390 (122 NW 626); Southern Ice &c. Co. v. Bench, 179 Okla. 50 (64 P2d 668).
The majority opinion (p. 328) goes even further and holds not only that the statute and record of convictions thereunder do not constitute probable cause (assuming the defendants are otherwise guilty) but they only pose a jury question as to lack of malice since "malice may be inferred from a total want of probable cause.” If the plaintiff acted in the belief that the statute was valid, which does not appear to be a contested fact, then to charge him ex post facto with malice because of lack of probable cause because the statute is now being construed differently from what it was at the time of the event is violative of fundamental concepts of justice. The determination must be made as of the time the warrant was taken out, on which date the statute was as a matter of fact completely viable and the words "for all purposes” were being given their usual meaning in the local courts. If this case is to turn only upon the interpretation of the statute, then a finding is demanded that there was probable cause at that time to believe the plaintiffs in this action guilty of a trespass.
This is a different matter from a mere interpretation of the law by a lay person or a lawyer because, even though the appellate courts had not spoken at the time the local courts had, thus giving judicial sanction (whether binding or not is of no importance because here we are dealing with motive, not legal consequences) to the interpretation put on the statute by the defendants in this case.
I believe the following case to be controlling on this point: Tanner-Brice Co. v. Barrs, 55 Ga. App. 453 (190 SE 676): "'In actions for malicious prosecution, the question is, not whether the plaintiff was guilty, but whether the defendant had reasonable cause to so believe — whether the circumstances were such as to create in the mind of the defendant a reasonable belief that there was probable cause for the prosecution. Johnson v. Miller, 63 *334Iowa 529. Probable cause is defined to be the existence of such facts and circumstances as would excite the belief in a reasonable mind, acting on the facts within the knowledge of the prosecutor, that the person charged was guilty of the crime for which he was prosecuted. 14 Am. & Eng. Enc. L. 24, and authorities cited.’ Hartshorn v. Smith, 104 Ga. 235, 239 (30 SE 666); Sirmans v. Peterson, 42 Ga. App. 707, 709 (157 SE 341); Hearn v. Batchelor, 47 Ga. App. 213 (170 SE 203).”
I am authorized to state that Presiding Judge Jordan and Judge Clarence L. Peeler, Jr., concur in this dissent.