Court Opinion

ID: 9665661
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 00:54:01.671684+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:01:22.955818
License: Public Domain

STEPHENSON, Justice
(concurring).
I concur in the decision that the judgment in this case must be reversed because *665of the erroneous instructions, but I do not agree with the reasoning of the majority opinion which brings into play the law of nuisance in determining the legal rights of the parties on retrial of the case. The majority opinion poses more questions in my mind than it provides answers. The appellant asserts that the provisions of the “broad form” deed, under which its operations were conducted, absolved the appellant from liability. My view is that the rights of the parties should be resolved under the law of minerals with respect to the rights of the surface owner whose improvements are damaged by the conduct of the mining operation. In recent years, this court has denied liability for damage to improvements, and the majority opinion avoids these holdings by basing a retrial on the law of nuisance. My view is that it would better serve the parties and those who will be affected in the future to hold that the present rule as to damages to improvements be withdrawn since in my view it is an artificial rule not based on stare decisis.
This rule of the law of minerals had its inception in Buchanan v. Watson, Ky., 290 S.W.2d 40 (1956). Buchanan represented the first holding of this court that the rights reserved by the “broad form” deed to the holder of the mineral estate after severance included the unqualified right to strip mine and in effect destroy the surface without liability for damages. The land there involved was in a state of nature, no improvements. Thereafter in Blue Diamond Coal Co. v. Neace, Ky., 337 S.W.2d 725 (1960), this right was elevated to include damages to improvements and improved property in the absence of conduct in the mining operation exercised oppressively, arbitrarily, wantonly or maliciously. There a garden and other improvements were damaged.
In between Buchanan and Blue Diamond, supra, we have Bevander Coal Co. v. Matney, Ky., 320 S.W.2d 301 (1959). There the mining operation damaged the surface owner’s fencing and trees, and caused other unspecified damages. The mining operator did not appeal from a jury verdict assessing these damages, probably because it never occurred to him that he was not liable for damages to improvements. The case was reversed on other grounds stated in the appeal and affirmed on the landowner’s cross-appeal that he was entitled to additional damages. The opinion states that the Buchanan case, involving a similar deed, “is decisive of the rights of defendant to additional damages. Any claim of defendant for additional damage must be grounded upon oppressive, arbitrary, wanton, or malicious acts.” The additional damages referred to in the opinion must have been damages to the surface in a state of nature as opposed to damages to improvements. Somewhere between Buchanan and Blue Diamond, it was conceived that the right to strip mine under the “broad form” deed also included the right to damage improvements and improved property without liability, absent, of course, conduct of oppressive, arbitrary, wanton, or malicious conduct. This rule was restated in Martin v. Kentucky Oak Mining Co., Ky., 429 S.W.2d 395 (1968), expressing the view that the “dominant” mineral estate contemplated damage or destruction of improved property and improvements without liability by the mine operator.
The purpose of this opinion is to point out the difference between the historical application of the law of mineral rights as applied to damage to the surface in a state of nature and damage to improvements and improved property. We do not have here a “strip mine” operation, and it would not be useful in this opinion to argue the merits of Buchanan as applied to damage to the surface in a state of nature. Historically in this jurisdiction, the mineral estate has been regarded as the dominant estate, and the surface is the subservient estate. The grant of minerals in the eye of the law carries with it the right to extract the minerals. This is a sound proposition. I think perhaps too much emphasis has been *666placed upon the provisions of the “broad form” deed in ascribing peculiar rights to this type mineral deed as opposed to the provisions of the mineral deeds which contain a variety of provisions, some extensively detailing the rights, others providing for “only necessary and convenient” mining rights. A good argument can be made that a mineral deed providing for “necessary and convenient” mining rights is broader and ordinarily confers more rights than the “broad form” deed, which enumerates extensive rights on the theory that the enumeration of rights limits the rights to those enumerated. The “waiver of damages” clause in the “broad form” deed seems to have been given the significance which to me is unwarranted. In reading the older cases, this clause would appear to be superfluous and have no real meaning. If the right to damage is granted, there is no question of liability. Throughout the long series of cases dealing with mining rights, whether those rights be general or specific, it has been recognized that the surface may be used as necessary and convenient or in accordance with specified rights for the mining operation without liability insofar as these rights are not exercised oppressively, arbitrarily, wantonly, or maliciously.
The difficulty in reconciling the principle that the “broad form” deed absolves liability for damage to improvements and improved property with the long line of cases involving mineral rights is that until Buchanan the cases arising from the eastern Kentucky coal fields pertained to deep mine operations. It is of interest to note the line of “subsidence” cases. Unless specifically provided for, liability was imposed in those cases where, in the underground mining operation, coal pillars were removed causing subsidence and breaks in the surface. North-East Coal Co. v. Hayes, 244 Ky. 639, 51 S.W.2d 960 (1932), states the rule: “As we have said, the right to mine is subservient to the right of the surface owners to have the surface maintained in its natural state free from subsidence or partings of the soil * * * .” This rule was deeply imbedded in mineral law in 1932 and is an exception to the right to use the surface in the necessary process of the mining operation. The “broad form” deed here enumerated subsidence rights specifically. Thus a deep mine operating under a “broad form” deed such as here could cause subsidence of the surface by pulling pillars without liability for damages.
A pertinent view of what had been considered to be the rule as to damages to improvements is contained in McIntire v. Marian Coal Co., 190 Ky. 342, 227 S.W. 298 (1921). There the terms of the mineral deed recited in the opinion appear to be a “broad form” deed. The opinion concludes that by the terms of the deed the operator could do anything necessary or convenient for the mining operation and further states:
“Undoubtedly, under the plain terms of the deed, the Marian Coal Company has the right and could by showing the necessity or convenience thereof use and occupy the whole surface of the land in question even to excluding the plaintiff and taking his house and garden, but such taking would have to be after satisfaction or adjudged compensation for such improvements, which is but another way of saying that the mineral estate under the deed is dominant, superior, and exclusive in every circumstance or condition where the owner thereof shall deem it necessary or convenient to make such use of the surface as the deed allows.” [Emphasis ours]
This illustrates my argument that this court has historically made a differentiation between the use of the surface in a state of nature without liability for damages and interfering with improvements on the surface.
A later case speaking on the same point is Kentucky West Virginia Gas Co. v. Crum, 258 Ky. 508, 80 S.W.2d 537 (1935). There the gas company was operating un*667der a “broad form” deed which the court characterized as similar if not identical to the deed discussed in Mclntire, supra, “which is of that class known as the modern mining right grants.” There the gas company entered the land for the purpose of drilling a gas well. In the course of the operation, which included hauling equipment, digging pipelines, etc., damage was done to fencing, timber, and crops. This court reaffirmed'the right of the holder of the mineral to use the surface in drilling the well and denied damages for that use, then stated:
“However, apparently there were some damages for which the appellee might recover, even under the broad grant under which appellant was operating. These items consist of the destruction of potatoes and corn and some timber, and failure to replace a short string of fencing.” [Emphasis ours]
This court held that the gas company could not be held liable for the damages caused by building its lines and hauling over the land, but was liable for the fair market value of the timber, corn, and potatoes at the time of their destruction and reasonable cost for the replacement of the fence.
Once again this court recognized the difference in the right to use the land in a state of nature and imposed liability for damages to improvements. At this point the “broad form” deed had not been construed as permitting damage to improvements without liability.
This case was cited in Buchanan in the paragraph on “waiver of damages” and further reinforces the argument that Buchanan went no further than to deny damages to land in a state of nature and is not authority for the later cases which deny liability for damages to improvements. The plain and simple fact is that liability for damages to improvements and improved property in the conduct of a mining operation was so well settled that no one thought otherwise until Blue Diamond, supra.
Finally turning to Martin, the opinion rejects estoppel as a basis for imposing liability for damages to improvements. Although not specified in the older cases cited in this opinion recognizing that liability should be imposed for damages to improvements, it is my view that this could well be the underlying basis for the rule enunciated in those cases holding that the “rights” contained in the “broad form” deed do not absolve the mine operator from liability for damages to improvements and improved property occasioned by the conduct of the mining operation.
I would impose strict liability for damages to the surface owners’ improvements, improved property, and merchantable timber occasioned by the conduct of a mining operation.