Court Opinion

ID: 9759346
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 00:13:36.502629+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:29:01.360325
License: Public Domain

POPE, Justice,
dissenting.
I respectfully dissent. The court has decided this cause upon the mistaken belief that the case is governed by the ownership of ground water. Plaintiffs assert no ownerships to the percolating waters pumped and extracted from the ground by defendants. They make no complaint that their own wells have been or will be pumped dry. They seek no damages for the defendants’ sale of the water. Plaintiffs’ action calls for no change in nor even a review of the English rule of “absolute ownership” of ground water, the American rule of “reasonable use” of ground water, nor the Texas rule of “nonwasteful” use of ground water. They claim no correlative rights in the water. The Texas law of percolating waters is not put in issue by this suit, and there is no occasion to overrule that law either now or prospectively. There is a question whether this court can or ought to do so after the Texas legislature has so often and so recently stated its intent that the law of ground waters should be respected. Tex.Water Code Ann. §§ 21.004,1 52.-002;2 1975 Tex.Gen.Laws, ch. 284, § 40, at 682 (creating Harris-Galveston Coastal Subsidence District).
Plaintiffs’ complaint is that defendants are causing subsidence of their land. They assert an absolute right to keep the surface of their land at its natural horizon. The landowners’ right to the subjacent support for their land is the only right in suit, and this is a case of original impression. Other areas of the law should not be disturbed, but the majority opinion needlessly does so. It is no more logical to say that this is a case concerning the right to ground water than it would be correct in a case in which an adjoining landowner removed lateral support by a caterpillar to say that the case would be governed by the law of caterpillars. In making this decision about one’s right to subjacent support, I would use as analogies other kinds of cases concerning support, such as the right to lateral support.
A landowner’s right to lateral support for his land is an absolute right. The instrument employed in causing land to slough off, cave in or wash away is not the real subject of inquiry. The inquiry is whether the adjoining owner actually causes the loss of support. Whether the support is destroyed by excavation, ditching, the flowing of water, the pumping of water, unnatural pressure, unnatural suction, or explosives, the right to support is the same, and it is an absolute right. Nichols v. Woodward Iron Company, 267 Ala. 401, 103 So.2d 319 (1958); Wiliiams v. Thompson, 152 Tex. 270, 256 S.W.2d 399 (1953); Whitehead v. Zeiller, 265 S.W.2d 689 (Tex.Civ.App.—Fort Worth 1954, no writ); Simon v. Nance, 100 S.W. 1038 (Tex.Civ.App. 1907, no writ); 2 C.J.S. Adjoining Landowners § 38 (1972). It was said in San Jacinto Sand Co. v. Southwestern Bell Tel. Co., 426 S.W.2d 338, 345 (Tex.Civ.App.—Houston [14th Dist.] 1968, writ ref’d n. r. e.), in a case that concerned both the lateral and subjacent right to support for a utility easement: “[T]he existence of the right to lateral support is an absolute right and is not subordi*32nate to any right of the adjoining proprietor.” Nichols v. Woodward Iron Company, supra. And again, the opinion stated, “Whether we say that necessary lateral and subjacent support of the easement here involved is an incident of appellee’s right to the complete enjoyment of the easements, or whether lateral and subjacent support is a separate right of property makes little practical difference.”
Respectable American authority supports the rule that a landowner has the right to the support afforded by subterranean waters. New York Central R. Co. v. Marinucci Bros. & Co., 337 Mass. 469, 149 N.E.2d 680 (1958); Gamer v. Milton, 346 Mass. 617, 195 N.E.2d 65 (1963), [rejecting the decision in Popplewell v. Hodkinson, L.R. 4 Ex. 248 (1869)]; Cabot v. Kingman, 166 Mass. 403, 44 N.E. 344 (1896); Bjorvatn v. Pacific Mechanical Construction, Inc., 77 Wash.2d 563, 464 P.2d 432 (1970); Muskatell v. City of Seattle, 10 Wash.2d 221, 116 P.2d 363 (1941); Farnandis v. Great Northern Ry. Co., 41 Wash. 486, 84 P. 18 (1906); 1 Am. Jur.2d Adjoining Landowners § 80 (1962); 2 C.J.S. Adjoining Landowners § 38 (1972); Annot., 4 A.L.R. 1104.
A second analogous rule which protects one’s subsurface from damage by an operator on other lands is found in Gregg v. Delhi-Taylor Oil Corp., 162 Tex. 26, 33, 344 S.W.2d 411, 416 (1961). Mr. Gregg, in the development of his mineral lease, was preparing to use a sand fracturing technique to open cracks and veins extending some distance from his lease and to alter the substructure of neighboring land. By use of hydraulic pressure the ruptures of the subsurface formations would free greater quantities of gas. The rupture beneath the Delhi-Taylor’s lands would create only small veins about one-tenth of an inch in diameter. This court regarded the creation of fissures on another’s land as an invasion of property rights. “The invasion alleged is direct and the action taken is intentional. . While the drilling bit of Gregg’s well is not alleged to have extended into Delhi-Taylor’s land, the same result is reached if in fact the cracks or veins extend into its land and gas is produced therefrom by Gregg.” This court denied one landowner the right to interfere with the subsurface of lands beyond his own lease boundaries. The same principle was applied in Gregg v. Delhi-Taylor Oil Corp., 162 Tex. 38, 344 S.W.2d 419 (1961), and in Delhi-Taylor Oil Corp. v. Holmes, 162 Tex. 39, 344 S.W.2d 420 (1961).
In my judgment, the examples are indistinguishable from the present case. The geologic changes that the defendants are creating beneath the surface of the plaintiffs’ land in the instant case are more severe than in the Gregg and Holmes cases. The plaintiffs made summary judgment showing that the defendants squeeze the water from the clay beneath plaintiffs’ lands, and the clay is then compressed and compacted so that the layers become thinner. The subterranean strata beneath plaintiffs’ land is wholly altered by the process. The process is permanent and irreversible. If one may not use pressure that alters the geologic status of one’s subsurface estate, how can we approve a process which reduces the pressure and which more grievously alters the subsurface estate? With respect I suggest, had we used the same argument in the Gregg and Holmes cases that is today employed, we would have approached the problem by looking at Gregg’s and Holmes’s right to capture the oil through its wellbore on its own lease. Once we determine that they had the right to capture and own the oil, we would have ruled that the case was solved. In Gregg and Holmes, we correctly looked at the damage to the neighbors’ subsurface estate that was threatened by one who had a complete legal right to capture from a wellbore on his own land the oil from beneath another’s land. The right of capture did not carry with it the right to destroy or interfere with the geology beneath another’s land.
Elliff v. Texon Drilling Co., 146 Tex. 575, 210 S.W.2d 558, 4 A.L.R.2d 191 (1948), was another example in which this court looked at the damage done a neighbor’s subsurface estate by an oil driller who had the right to capture oil through the wellbore on his own *33lease. This court expressly rejected holdings by the Louisiana Supreme Court which held that an adjoining owner has no action against one who negligently destroys a reservoir. This court also rejected the defense that one’s right to capture the oil rendered him immune from damages for his negligence in wasting it.
We thus reach the end result. Under our prior holdings compared with today’s, one who mines for oil may not destroy his neighbor’s subjacent geology; but the right to pump water, we inconsistently say, is the right to destroy the subsurface geology, the subjacent support and even the surface of the land. Defendants may pump the plaintiffs’ land to the bottom of Galveston Bay.
There is a third analogous area which has rejected the approach and result of today’s decision. This area of the law is one in which one party actually contracts with another that the latter may remove the minerals beneath his surface estate. This area of the law presents the contest between the rights of the servient surface estate and the dominant mineral estate. This court has already held that the owner of the dominant estate may not exercise his rights to the point of destruction. In Acker v. Guinn, 464 S.W.2d 348, 352 (Tex.1971), we wrote that the grant of a right to mine for substances does not contemplate “that the utility of the surface for agricultural or grazing purposes will be destroyed or substantially impaired.” Even when the right to mine had been granted by contract, we rejected a practice that would consume or destroy the surface estate. Consistent with that trend to avoid the destruction of the surface estate, we also made our decision in Getty Oil Co. v. Jones, 470 S.W.2d 618 (Tex.1971). In Getty Oil, we protected the ser-vient surface estate from the dominant mineral estate which did no more than interfere with an automatic irrigation system. If, therefore, this court will protect a ser-vient estate in its operation of a watering system, surely we will protect an owner of an absolute property right to subjacent support from a neighbor whose practice is thrusting his land beneath the sea. See also, Humble Oil & Refining Company v. West, 508 S.W.2d 812 (Tex.1974); Winslow v. Duval County Ranch Company, 519 S.W.2d 217 (Tex.Civ.App.—Beaumont 1975, writ ref’d n. r. e.); Hanen, The Surface Mineral Producer v. The Oil and Gas Producer; A Need For Peaceful Coexistence, 29 Baylor L.Rev. 907 (1977).
The error of the majority is its narrow focus upon the right of the defendants to pump ground water. We should enlarge our vision so we can see what this lawsuit is about. I do not believe it is sound law that the right to pump water is the power to destroy the surface of surrounding landowners. If defendants argue that they have an absolute right to pump groundwater, plaintiffs reply that they too have an absolute right to the support of their natural surface. According to some of the summary judgment proofs, the defendants with knowledge have destroyed and are destroying the natural surface estate of the plaintiffs. The summary judgment proofs include showings that the plaintiffs own lands that were originally seven feet above sea level; today their land is flooded or subject to periodic flooding and the situation is getting worse. The natural shoreline banks which once protected lands from Galveston Bay and Clear Lake have now fallen below sea level. Lands are innundat-ed. More lands will be innundated in the future. Lands that were once above sea level are now under salt water.
There is yet another legal principle that we should observe. Many things, though lawful, when done to excess, become remediable. Church bells may toll the knell of parting day or announce the time for solemn services, but when bells continuously clang without interruption for many days, the rights of others spring into being. What we do cannot be understood except in relation to those we touch. We have in this case the pleadings and showing that the defendants have abused their right to pump water to the point that property and the rights of others are ignored and destroyed.
Plaintiffs asserted their action upon theories of negligence, intentional tort, nui-*34sanee, and a taking of their property. In my opinion, subject to proof, they have an action on the first three theories.
I therefore dissent from this court’s treatment of this case as one which concerns ownership of ground water. I dissent from this court’s endorsement of English water cases that have been rejected in this country. I dissent from this court’s adherence to the Restatement of Torts § 818. As discussed above, Texas has its own developed and developing law in this area of the law that is fair and equitable. The members of the Restatement Committee are neither legislators nor members of the Congress, and we do not need their help in this instance.
I dissent from the court’s holding that this case is governed by the stare decisis of ground water cases. There has not previously been a case like this in Texas and there is no stare decisis applicable. Damages for subsidence was not the issue when courts were writing City of Corpus Christi v. City of Pleasanton, 154 Tex. 289, 276 S.W.2d 798 (1955), and Texas Co. v. Burkett, 117 Tex. 16, 296 S.W. 273 (1927), and Houston & T. C. Ry. Co. v. East, 98 Tex. 146, 81 S.W. 279 (1904). The parties in these cases were fighting over water rights. Nor was that the issue in Acton v. Blundeli, 12 Meeson & Welsby 324, 152 Eng.Rep. 1223 (Ex.1843). The law stated by those cases need not and should not be disturbed by today’s opinion. Because there is no stare decisis, I also dissent from the court’s holding that plaintiffs can have no remedy except by a retroactive application of the law. The defendants, according to some of the summary judgment proofs, had knowledge from expert opinions that their course of action would cause subsidence. When the defendants, after warning, elect to take their risks in an area in which there are no precedents, I see no reason to apply our holding prospectively. No property law had attached in this instance. I dissent from the court’s dicta that the legislature has in some fashion recognized or legislated about the defendants’ immunity. Where is that legislation found?
Finally, and importantly, I dissent from the majority’s holding that landowners in the future may prosecute a suit for damages for the destruction of their property if, and only if the action is one for negligence, wilful waste, or malicious injury. I rather assume that pumpers of ground water will carefully do so, will not waste their water, and will bear no ill will toward those whose property they are destroying. In fact, pumpers more probably, will feel benignly toward those who regrettably must suffer the loss of their lands under the law of Friendswood Development Company v. Smith-Southwest Industries, Inc.
I would hold that an owner of land may assert an action against one who destroys the lateral or subjacent support to his land in its natural state when: (1) he engages in conduct knowing that it will cause damages to another’s land by loss or destruction of the subjacent support, Paris Purity Coal Co. v. Pendergrass, 193 Ark. 1031, 104 S.W.2d 455 (1937); or (2) the plaintiff proves negligence, or (3) the plaintiff proves a nuisance, and here a balancing will be a factor. Justice Williams, the author of East also wrote Gulf, C. & S. F. Ry. Co. v. Oakes, 94 Tex. 155, 58 S.W. 999 (1900), and accepted this reasonable solution to the resolution of the conflict between two property rights:
It is a general principle of the law that the owner of property may use it as he chooses in any lawful way; but another maxim, in general terms, requires him to so use it as not to injure another. . Since the owner may use his land as he chooses, if he does not violate any law, and is not to be substantially deprived of its use or of the ordinary pursuit of his own interests, but, at the same time, is required in its use to avoid injury to another, it at once follows that he may be required to forego a particular use when it is not essential to the substantial enjoyment of his property, and is fraught with unreasonable loss to his neighbor. On the other hand, the particular use may be so important to the owner, and the loss or inconvenience to his neighbor so slight compared to his, were he forbidden to so *35employ his property, that it would be unreasonable and unjust to impose such a restriction. In such cases, it is evident that all of the circumstances of the situation must be taken into consideration. The importance of the use to the owner, as well as the extent of the damage to be inflicted upon his neighbor, and the rights of the parties, are to be adjusted in a practical way; the question being whether or not the proposed use is a reasonable one, under all the circumstances. . As is said in some of the authorities, there must, in such inquiries where rights and interests seem to conflict, be a balancing of them. Id. at 1000-01.
The balancing of lawful but competing property rights has been the rule previously approved by our Texas courts. Storey v. Central Hide & Rendering Co., 148 Tex. 509, 226 S.W.2d 615 (1950); City of Texarkana v. Reagan, 112 Tex. 317, 247 S.W. 816 (1923); Crossman v. City of Galveston, 112 Tex. 303, 247 S.W. 810 (1923); Galveston, H. & S. A. Ry. Co. v. De Groff, 102 Tex. 433, 118 S.W. 134 (1909); Columbian Carbon Co. v. Tholen, 199 S.W.2d 825 (Tex.Civ.App.—Galveston 1947, writ ref’d). We wrote in Elliff v. Texon Drilling Co., 146 Tex. 575, 584, 210 S.W.2d 558, 563 (1948), “In the conduct of one’s business or in the use and exploitation of one’s property, the law imposes upon all persons the duty to exercise ordinary care to avoid injury or damage to the property of others.” That rule is fair. It has often been applied in Texas as appears from the citations above and there are many others. Rogers v. Scaling, 298 S.W.2d 877 (Tex.Civ.App.—Fort Worth 1957, writ ref’d n. r. e.); Hoover v. Horton, 209 S.W.2d 646 (Tex.Civ.App.—Amarillo 1948, no writ); Brown v. Cooper, 31 S.W. 316 (Tex.Civ.App. 1895, no writ). See also, Wright, Establishing Liability For Damage Resulting From the Use of Underground Percolating Water: Smith-Southwest Industries v. Friendswood Development Company, 15 Hous.L.Rev. 454 (1978).
I also dissent from the court’s denial of rights to the plaintiffs, while acknowledging that future landowners may have an action at least in negligence. This court, in recent years, has recognized a number of new actions, and each time, the successful party was allowed the victory. Among the recent examples are Whittlesey v. Miller, 572 S.W.2d 665 (Tex.1978) [consortium]; Parker v. Highland Park, Inc., 565 S.W.2d 512 (Tex.1978) [abolition of no-duty doctrine in premises cases]; Bounds v. Caudle, 560 S.W.2d 925 (Tex.1977) [interspousal tort immunity abolished in case of wilful and intentional torts]; Farley v. MM Cattle Company, 529 S.W.2d 751 (Tex.1975) [abolition of voluntary assumption of risk]; Felsenthal v. McMillan, 493 S.W.2d 729 (Tex.1973) [criminal conversation]; Getty Oil Company v. Jones, 470 S.W.2d 618 (Tex.1971) [dominant estate limited by rule of reasonable necessity]. In my opinion, it is basically unfair to treat the plaintiffs in this case unequally by recognizing that they possess an action, but by denying them the remedy.
I would affirm the judgment of the court of civil appeals.
SAM D. JOHNSON, J., joins in this dissent.

. Nothing in this chapter affects ownership rights in underground water.

. The ownership and rights of the owner of the land and his lessees and assigns in underground water are hereby recognized, and nothing in this code shall be construed as depriving or divesting the owner or his lessees and assigns of the ownership or rights, subject to the rules promulgated by a district under this chapter.