Court Opinion

ID: 9570367
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 20:22:41.582617+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:07:10.281019
License: Public Domain

Chief Justice Exum
dissenting.
The majority interprets N.C.G.S. § 1-44.2 as creating a conclusive presumption of title in the land underlying a railroad easement after the lapse of the statutory one-year period and automatically transferring title from whoever might own the property to the adjoining landowner. I do not so interpret the statute and am of the view that the majority reads more into the statute than the legislature intended.
In the first place, the statute clearly provides that the presumption which it establishes is not conclusive but “is rebuttable by showing that a party has good and valid title to the land.” Second, by the statute’s clear language, only those who claim ownership contrary to the presumption must bring an action to establish ownership within *452the one-year statutory period. Persons claiming ownership in accordance with the presumption are not so limited in the time within which they may bring their claim.
The statute, in my view, operates as follows: When a railroad abandons its easement, the statute establishes a rebuttable presumption that title to the land underlying the easement resides in the owner of land adjacent to the easement, and the title extends to the centerline of the abandoned easement. One claiming ownership contrary to this presumption has the statutory period of one year to bring an action to establish ownership. The presumption operates against such a claimant, but the claimant may rebut the presumption by showing “good and valid title to the land.” Presumably this means title which is superior to that the adjoining landowner would have but for the presumption. If such a claim of superior title is not brought within the statutory period, it is procedurally barred and may not be thereafter asserted against the adjacent owner, either offensively or defensively. The title of the adjacent landowner is then secure and that of the challenging claimant lost not because the statutory presumption is conclusive or because title is transferred but because the statutory period of limitations for challenging the adjacent landown-. er’s title has expired. The statute does not abrogate vested rights or transfer title from one person to another. It merely establishes the procedure by which title under the limited circumstances defined by the statute must be claimed. Failure to claim title in accordance with this procedure bars the right to claim title thereafter.
As applied to the case before us, the statute works as follows: Plaintiff McDonald’s Corporation (McDonald’s) is claiming ownership to the land underlying the abandoned easement in accord with the statutory presumption. McDonald’s is entitled to the benefit of the presumption. Not having challenged, or sought to rebut, this presumption by a claim filed within the one-year statutory period of limitations, defendants are barred from doing so now. Defendants are not barred because the statutory presumption is conclusive or because the statute transfers title from them to McDonald’s. Whether, leaving aside the statutory presumption, they have better title than McDonald’s, has never been determined in a way which binds McDonald’s. Defendants are barred from claiming they have title superior to McDonald’s because they “slept on their rights” and did not assert their claims against McDonald’s within the time prescribed by the statute.
*453The majority gets off track in this case by assuming that but for the statutory presumption defendants have record title to the property superior to that of McDonald’s. The majority states, “Plaintiff does not contend that it has record title to the property at issue.” This, I believe, is not the case. Both McDonald’s and defendants claim to have superior record title. According to the forecast of evidence at the summary judgment hearing, the property was at one time owned by the Pepsi Cola Company (Pepsi). Pepsi filed bankruptcy in 1923 at which time Craven Holding Corporation (Craven) was incorporated in Virginia for the purpose of holding and making disposition of property owned by Pepsi. At this time the railroad had an active railroad easement over the property. Craven conveyed the property in question in 1923 and dissolved in 1931. McDonald’s claims record title through mesne conveyances from Craven.1 Defendants claim record title through quitclaim deeds from the heirs of deceased shareholders of Craven.”2
Surely, in the interest of fairly settling titles, the constitution permits the state to establish a reasonable time within which one who claims title to land underlying an abandoned railroad easement must assert the claim against one who owns the land adjoining the easement or otherwise lose the right to do so. One year for the assertion of such claims is a reasonable time. The one-year period of limitations being reasonable, I see no constitutional infirmity in the statute.
My position is supported by Sheets v. Walsh, 217 N.C. 32, 34, 6 S.E.2d 817 (1940) and Texaco v. Short, 454 U.S. 516, 70 L. Ed. 2d 738 (1982).
In Sheets, an action seeking specific performance of a contract to convey realty, the plaintiff promisee had record title to certain prop*454erty, portions of which had previously been dedicated for public use as roads. The dedicated land had not, however, been developed as roads for more than twenty years and no one had brought suit to enforce any easement rights. Plaintiff asserted that it had ownership of the land under the following statutory provision:
[Ejvery strip, piece, or parcel of land which shall have been at any time dedicated to public use . . . which shall not have been actually opened and used by the public within twenty years from and after the dedication thereof, shall be thereby conclusively presumed to have been abandoned by the public for the purposes for which same shall have been dedicated; and no person shall have any right, or cause of action thereafter, to enforce any public or private easement therein, unless such right shall have been asserted within two years from and after the passage of this act.
Id. at 36, 6 S.E.2d at 819. Defendant promisor, seeking to avoid the contract on the ground plaintiff did not have good title, contended this statute was not effective in that it constituted an unconstitutional taking since “the dedicators, predecessors in title of the plaintiffs, sold and conveyed lots to others by reference to the maps filed and recorded by them, the grantees in the deeds for such lots, and those claiming under them, were thereby vested with easements over all the streets shown on said maps.” Id. at 38-39, 6 S.E.2d at 821.
The plaintiff and defendant in Sheets took positions comparable to those taken by plaintiff McDonald’s and defendants here. The statute in Sheets, just as the statute here, required those seeking to claim their easement rights do so within two years or forever lose their right to make the claim. Concluding that the statute was constitutional, the Court reasoned:
Any rights to enforce any easements which the grantees in the deeds made with reference to the maps, and of those claiming under them, may have had was clearly preserved for two years after its passage by the act itself. No vested right was destroyed by the act, only the remedy by which such rights might be enforced was changed, and when this was done these grantees, and those claiming under them, were left with a remedy reasonably adequate to afford relief, namely, two years after the passage of the act in which to assert their rights.
Id. at 39, 6 S.E.2d at 821. The Court found this result fair since “[t]he grantees . . . were fixed by law with notice of the statutes, and it was *455incumbent upon them within the two years allowed by the statute (a reasonable time) to take themselves out of the bar put upon them by asserting their right of easements over the streets involved.” Id. at 39-40, 6 S.E.2d at 821.
The majority attempts to distinguish Sheets on the basis that it involved land which was not used by the parties asserting title contrary to the statutory presumption. Sheets, however, was not decided upon whether these parties possessed or used the land, but upon the fact that they were by law on notice of their statutory duty to assert their rights within a reasonable time. I think Sheets controls the instant case.
Texaco likewise supports the constitutionality of our statute. In Texaco the Supreme Court upheld an Indiana statute barring mineral rights claims which were not asserted within a certain statutory period. The statute provided that a severed mineral interest which is not used for twenty years reverts to the current surface owner of the property unless the mineral owner filed a claim to his rights within two years. Id. at 518, 538, 70 L. Ed. at 743-44, 756. Not having filed its claim within the statutory period, the mineral rights claimant lost its right to make the claim. The Supreme Court found no constitutional infirmity in the procedural bar of the statute.
The majority attempts to distinguish Texaco on the ground it also involved rights which were unused. Nowhere in Texaco, however, is there an indication that the decision was based upon the mineral rights claimant’s failure to use the right in question. The Court’s decision was instead based on the principle that “persons owning property within a State are charged with knowledge of relevant statutory provisions affecting the control or disposition of such property.” Id. at 532, 70 L. Ed. 2d at 752. The Court concluded that the constitution did not require more notice than that provided by the statute. Id. at 537, 70 L. Ed. 2d at 756.
Other states have upheld similar statutes which require persons to assert their rights within certain time periods or else forsake them. In Presbytery of Southeast Iowa v. Harris, 226 N.W.2d 232, 235, cert. denied, 423 U.S. 830, 46 L. Ed. 2d 48 (1975), for example, the Supreme Court of Iowa faced a statute which provided that those with reversionary interests in land who did not file a claim for that interest within the latter of twenty years of the deed creating that interest or one year after enactment of the statute would be barred from maintaining an action to claim their interest. The Court upheld the statute, rea*456soning that the statute “does not abolish or alter any vested right. Rather, it modifies the procedure for effectuation of the remedy by conditionally limiting the time for enforcement of the right.” Id. at 242. The Court also found that the statute itself provided .adequate notice of the time limitation for filing claims. Id. The Court reached its conclusions after examining several cases from other jurisdictions and “the numerous commentators who persuasively argue that statutes premised on the theory the legislature may require periodic filing in order to preserve rights do not run afoul of constitutional limitations.” Id. at 241.
The majority relies on University v. North Carolina Railroad Company, 76 N.C 103 (1877). This case is readily distinguishable. The University sued the railroad claiming it was entitled to certain unpaid stock dividends still held by the railroad. The statute under which the University claimed provided that declared stock dividends which were unclaimed for five years shall be paid by the issuing corporation to the University. The question in the case, as stated by the Court, was “whether the provisions of the Act are warranted by Art. IX, § 6, of the Constitution . ...” Id. at 105. The constitutional provision in question provided, in pertinent part, “that all . . . unclaimed dividends, or distributive shares of the estates of deceased persons, shall be apportioned to the use of the University.” The Court held that this constitutional provision was directed to the estates of deceased persons and did not authorize the legislature to transfer unclaimed dividends of living persons from the issuing corporation to the University. The first point is that this case involved stock dividends, not real property. Second, the dispute was not between the shareholder and the University; it was between the University and the issuing corporation. Third, the case involved an attempt by the plaintiff University to have personal property, the entitlement to stock dividends, transferred from the shareholders to it by the issuing corporation. Since the case did not involve shareholders who themselves were trying to assert their rights, no issue as to whether they could be procedurally barred from doing so arose. The Court noted this, essentially distinguishing the issue in that case from the issue now before us, saying:
The counsel for the plaintiff endeavored to support their case, by drawing an analogy between the operation of the statute of limitations and the Act under which they claim. The analogy fails them. The statute of limitations bars the remedy only, and the debtor retains the possession of his property. But the Act under review, not only bars the creditor of his right of recovery, *457but takes from him his property, transfers it to another and enables that other to recover and own it. The creditor not only loses his property, but by the magic of this Act and without consideration received, it is vested absolutely in another — it matters not whether that other is the State or its appointee.
Id. at 107.
As I have tried to demonstrate, the statute under consideration here does not transfer property from one party to another. The question of which party has better title is not reached. The statute simply creates a procedural bar to a claim of title contrary to the statutory presumption.
The trial court properly entered summary judgment for plaintiffs. I vote, therefore, to reverse the Court of Appeals, which reversed the trial court, and to reinstate the judgment of the trial court.
Justice Meyer joins in this dissenting opinion.

. McDonald’s states in its brief, “Plaintiff owns the property at issue. There is no evidence that Craven intended to retain ownership of the fee underneath the railroad easement when it conveyed all of the property adjacent to the railroad. . . . Plaintiff is the successor to the adjacent landowner to whom Craven conveyed the property.”

. Defendants claim that the description of the property in McDonald’s record title does not include the property underlying the easement and that this issue was settled in Matter of Craven Holding Corporation, No. 88CVS713, Superior Court, Craven County, by order dated 3 November 1989, from which no appeal was taken. I do not read the order as settling this issue. The order simply extinguishes Craven’s interest in the property and concludes that this interest, whatever it was, had been transferred to defendants successor in title. In any event, to the extent this order might purport to resolve the issue of record title as between defendants and McDonald’s, McDonald’s is not bound by the order since it was not a party to the litigation.