Court Opinion

ID: 9578426
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 21:45:10.457801+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:25:06.017208
License: Public Domain

JOHNSON, Judge
(dissenting).
I respectfully dissent from the opinion of the court. A district court sitting in equity has broad discretion to fashion an equitable remedy based on the particular facts of a given case. In this case, the district court granted the Gablers a prescriptive easement that would allow them to continue using the driveway that connects their home to the nearest public road. I would conclude that the district court did not abuse its broad discretion when it granted the Gablers that equitable remedy and declined to grant the broader equitable remedy of a boundary by practical location.
In describing traditional principles of American law, the United States Supreme Court has said that, as a matter of “comprehensive application,”
courts of equity ... are clothed with large discretion to model their judgments to fit the exigencies of the particular case.... To forget it is to forget equity’s special function and historic significance. The transcendence of this doctrine derives from the recognition that without it the effort to dispense equal justice under law would all too often be frustrated....
We are dealing here with the requirements of equity practice with a background of several hundred years of history.... The essence of equity jurisdiction has been the power of the Chancellor to do equity and to mould each decree to the necessities of the particular case. Flexibility rather than rigidity has distinguished it. The qualities of mercy and practicality have made equity the instrument for nice adjustment and reconciliation between the public interest and private needs as well as between competing private claims....
United States v. E.I. du Pont de Nemours & Co., 366 U.S. 316, 357-58, 81 S.Ct. 1243, 1266, 6 L.Ed.2d 318 (1961) (quotations omitted); see also Grupo Mexicano de Desarrollo S.A. v. Alliance Bond Fund, Inc., 527 U.S. 308, 336, 119 S.Ct. 1961, 1976, 144 L.Ed.2d 319 (1999). “ ‘Since all or almost all equitable remedies are discretionary, the balancing of equities and hardships is appropriate in almost any case as a guide to the chancellor’s discretion.’ ” Tennessee Valley Auth. v. Hill, 437 U.S. 153, 193, 98 S.Ct. 2279, 2301, 57 L.Ed.2d 117 (1978) (quoting D. Dobbs, Remedies 52 (1973)).
A district court’s discretion to fashion an equitable remedy includes the discretion to order a narrow remedy instead of a broad remedy, even if a plaintiff has proved facts that would justify the broad remedy. In some situations, a district court even may decline to order any equitable remedy. As a leading treatise has explained, “After balancing the equities and hardships a court might deny all [equitable] relief to the plaintiff [or, alternatively,] simply limit relief in accord with its view of the equities or hardships.” 1 Dan B. Dobbs, Law of Remedies 113 (2d ed.1993). Stated differ*736ently, “courts may recognize the plaintiffs right, and yet refuse to enforce it, or enforce it in limited ways,” or “narrow the remedy to reflect something less than the right the plaintiff began with,” even in the absence of an equitable defense. Id. at 109,113.
The Minnesota Supreme Court has recognized that a district court sitting in equity has broad discretion when determining an equitable remedy. Nadeau v. County of Ramsey, 277 N.W.2d 520, 524 (Minn.1979). Sometimes discretionary considerations are embedded within the enumerated elements of an equitable theory of relief. See Olson v. Synergistic Tech. Sys., Inc., 628 N.W.2d 142, 152 (Minn.2001) (discussing equitable nature of promissory es-toppel, including third element, whether “the promise [must] be enforced to prevent injustice”). But sometimes the discretionary factors relevant to an equitable theory are considered after the pertinent facts are determined. For example, “A party does not have an automatic right to specific performance as a remedy for breach of a contract; the district court must balance the equities of the case and determine whether the equitable remedy of specific performance is appropriate.” Dakota County H.R.A. v. Blackwell, 602 N.W.2d 243, 244 (Minn.1999) (citing Boulevard Plaza Corp. v. Campbell, 254 Minn. 123, 134, 94 N.W.2d 273, 283 (1959)). As another example, the doctrine of res judicata is defined by enumerated elements that must be proved, see Brown-Wilbert, Inc. v. Copeland Buhl & Co., 732 N.W.2d 209, 220 (Minn.2007), but it nonetheless remains a “flexible,” “equitable doctrine that must be applied in light of the facts of each individual case.” R.W. v. T.F., 528 N.W.2d 869, 872 n. 3 (Minn.1995). Accordingly, after considering the evidence on each of the enumerated elements of res judicata, a court may inquire whether the doctrine’s “application would work an injustice on the party against whom estoppel is urged.” Id.
The importance of equitable discretion in boundary-dispute cases is reflected in Wojahn v. Johnson, 297 N.W.2d 298 (Minn.1980). After fixing the location of a boundary, the district court enjoined the plaintiffs from trespassing on the defendants’ property. On appeal, the supreme court held that it was reversible error for the district court to have entered an injunction as a matter of course without considering a more equitable resolution. The court wrote:
It is true that in the ordinary run of cases a “[p]ermanent injunction is a proper remedy to restrain a continuous and repeatedly threatened trespass.” However, injunction is an equitable remedy, involving the equitable jurisdiction of the court, and an injunction should not be issued where it would be grossly inequitable to do so....

[Wjefeel that a balancing of the equities is more just than the automatic grant of an injunction as is typically the case.

Id. at 307 (emphasis added) (quotations omitted). The supreme court remanded the case so that the district court could consider granting an easement to the plaintiff, which would allow the plaintiffs as well as the defendants to continue using the driveway. Id. at 307-08. The Wojahn opinion illustrates that a district court has broad discretion to fashion an equitable remedy in a boundary-dispute case based on the particular facts of the case.
In this case, the district court issued a thorough 12-page order and memorandum. In relevant part, the district court concluded as follows:
Plaintiffs have proved through clear and convincing evidence that they are entitled to either a prescriptive easement for use of the driveway or a bound*737ary by practical location. As this Court finds Plaintiffs have proved entitlement under either theory, the Court must choose one. In the context of this case, the Court feels the most just resolution is to grant Plaintiffs a prescriptive easement over Defendants’ land. This entitles Plaintiffs to use the driveway in the same manner as they have historically used it, unimpeded by Defendants, while allowing Defendants to maintain title to the land itself.
The district court’s analysis reflects a deliberate weighing of the equities and a conscious attention to the appropriateness of its chosen remedy. The district court’s judgment recognized both the Gablers’ interest in continuing to use the driveway and the burdens imposed on the' Fedo-ruks’ property interests. The district court selected a remedy that was' sufficient to allow the Gablers to accomplish their primary goal without providing them additional property rights. It is appropriate for a district court to consider costs and benefits when fashioning an equitable remedy and to seek a remedy that is efficient. “No remedial analysis is complete until the costs and benefits have been counted,” and “judges will want to consider the alternatives before inflicting a remedy that costs more to the defendant than it is worth to the plaintiff.” Dobbs at 33, 35-36; see also generally id. at 36-50. The district court’s chosen remedy not only made a distinction between ownership and an easement but also between a larger and a smaller geographic area. The latter distinction prevented the Ga-blers from expanding the width of their lot in the area between the driveway and the lake, which would have added to their shoreline (with a corresponding contraction in the length of the Fedoruks’ shoreline), due to the actions of the Gablers’ predecessors-in-interest, who mistakenly built a driveway outside the boundaries of their own lot. This is a classic example of a district court’s discretionary consideration of the equities when fashioning an equitable remedy.
The majority extracts a short passage from Moore v. Henricksen, 282 Minn. 509, 165 N.W.2d 209 (1968), which the majority acknowledges to be dicta, and adopts it as a rule of law. The passage cannot be interpreted to preclude the equitable relief awarded by the district court in this case. The supreme court merely referred to the fact that the district court, having ruled in plaintiffs favor on two other theories of relief, elected not to expressly consider the plaintiffs third theory. The district court apparently believed that an analysis of the third theory was unnecessary. The Moore court did not hold, and did not suggest, that a district court may not simultaneously consider the issue of boundary by practical location and the issue of prescriptive easement and fashion a remedy based on the latter but not the former.
None of the other cases on which the majority relies is inconsistent with the long-recognized discretion of a district court to balance equitable considerations and award a narrower equitable remedy than might have been justified by the evidence. In none of the cases cited by the majority did the supreme court or this court overrule a district court that had fashioned an equitable remedy that was narrower than the broadest possible form of relief. The cases cited are descriptive, not prescriptive, and they describe only the tendencies of district courts in this type of case. Even if a certain form of equitable relief is typical or favored, it is not automatic. See Wojahn, 297 N.W.2d at 307 (stating that equitable remedy should not be ordered if “it would be grossly inequitable to do so”); Lindquist v. Weber, 404 N.W.2d 884, 887 (Minn.App.1987) (“Mindful that the proceeding to ac*738quire prescriptive rights to land is equitable in nature, we agree with the trial court that it would be highly inequitable to deny respondents’ claim under the facts of this case.”), review denied (Minn. June 26, 1987). It may be that district courts often do not fully utilize their discretion when sitting in equity, but that does not mean that district courts do not have that manner of discretion. As the supreme court has stated, “a party bringing an equitable action must maintain it on equitable grounds or fail, even though he prove a good cause of action at law on the trial.” First Div. St. Paul & Pac. R.R. Co. v. Rice, 25 Minn. 278, 284 (1878).
In light of the broad discretion historically afforded to district courts, an abuse-of-discretion standard of review should apply to this case. See Nadeau, 277 N.W.2d at 524 (“Granting equitable relief is within the sound discretion of the trial court. Only a clear abuse of that discretion will result in reversal.”); Claussen v. City of Lauderdale, 681 N.W.2d 722, 726 (Minn.App.2004) (applying abuse-of-discretion standard of review in case involving adverse claims to property); Block v. Sexton, 577 N.W.2d 521, 526 (Minn.App.1998) (holding that “district court acted well within its discretion by limiting [easement’s] width”). The majority opinion effectively deprives a district court of any discretion in fashioning a remedy in this type of case. A district court sitting in equity should not be obligated to act so mechanically. Furthermore, it is simply unnecessary to impose such tight constraints on a district court’s equitable powers. It has not been demonstrated that the caselaw that has existed for many years is unworkable or unjust on a broad scale.
Having concluded that the district court did not abuse its discretion by awarding the Gablers a prescriptive easement, I also would conclude that the district court did not abuse its discretion by awarding a payment of money to the Fedoruks to compensate them for the value of the property interest that was transferred to the Gablers. The award of money damages has legal support in Wojahn, where the supreme court stated that, on remand, the district court could award “the remedy of damages [to] compensate [defendants] for plaintiffs’ future use of the driveway in the nature of an easement for ingress and egress to their home.” 297 N.W.2d at 308. The supreme court further stated that “the measure of such damages should be the difference in value of the defendants’ property with or without future use.” Id.
For these reasons, I would affirm the judgment of the district court.