Court Opinion

ID: 9543656
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:47:49.338937+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:10:50.116042
License: Public Domain

Kimball, Justice
(concurring)
I concur in the affirmance of the judgment because I think, the amended petition does not state a ground of forfeiture as provided for the deed of 1918, and that the grounds of forfeiture were not enlarged by the writing of 1938.
Two grounds of forfeiture are stated in the last paragraph of the deed of 1918, quoted in the foregoing-opinion. One, the failure to erect a City Hall building *482on the property, is not involved in the action. The other ground, as set forth in the deed, is “in case said described property (block 32) is disposed of for any other purposes than those stipulated” in the preceding paragraph, that is, “for the maintenance thereon of such City Hall for the City of Casper and also for the maintenance of a Public Park.”
The property was used for the two permitted purposes from 1918 to 1940, and the petition does not allege that thereafter the part of property that could be used for the maintenance of a public park was not used for that purpose. If it be conceded for the moment that, after 1940, the property was disposed of for a purpose other than the maintenance of a City Hall, there is authority for holding that the continued maintenance of a park on the property prevents a forfeiture. Humphrey County Board v. Baker, 124 Tenn. 39, 134 S. W. 863. It is not necessary, however, that we affirm the judgment on this ground alone.
The rule of strict construction of conditions subsequent in order to prevent a forfeiture has been sufficiently explained by the Chief Justice, and I agree that the use or non-use of the City Hall building, as alleged in amended petition, was not a disposal of the property. I want to concede that “dispose of” may in some cases be given a broad meaning. Contentions involving the words have been considered by this court in at least three cases. State ex rel. Cross v. Board of Land Commissioners (on petition for rehearing) 50 Wyo. 205, 62 P. 2d. 516; Merryman v. School District, 43 Wyo. 376, 5 P. 2d 267, and Richardson v. Midwest Refining Co., 39 Wyo. 58, 82-83, 270 P. 154, 162. In the Richardson case we cited In re Hubbell, Trustee, 135 Ia. 637, 113 N. W. 512, 13 L. R. A. (N. S.) 496, 14 Ann. Cases 640, wherein the Iowa court, considering a trust deed which provided that the trustee should not “sell or dis*483pose of” certain land, held that a long-term lease was not a disposal of the property.
The writing of 1938, also quoted in the foregoing opinion, shows on its face that it was made in contemplation of a possible, but not required, joint use of the property by the City of Casper and the County of Natrona, and the plaintiffs allege in their petition that the writing was made “for the purpose of permitting certain additional uses therein specified and no others.” In granting the permission for additional uses, the corporate grantor imposed numerous conditions or restrictions in addition to those stated in the deed of 1918, and I think a reasonable construction of the writing of 1938 requires us to hold that the additional conditions which were intended to be binding on both the city and the county, were not intended to create new and more burdensome conditions on the city until it used the property for the additional purposes. This construction does not, I think, raise a question of lack of consideration, but means that the City’s promise to abide by conditions more onerous than those imposed by the deed of 1918 was subject to a condition precedent, the use of the property for additional purposes, a matter that was optional with the City and depended also on the will of the County. See Williston on Contracts, § 1970.
Judge Blume, in a dissenting opinion, suggests that it may have been intended that the City Hall and gorunds surrounding should be a sort of monument to the memory of Joseph M. Carey, and later in the opinion says that the monument, if such was the intendment of the conveyance of 1918, is gone. There has been no reference to a monument in the record or discussions by counsel. But the remarks are interesting, they omit to give the City any credit for erecting the building, establishing the public park, and for caring *484for the property for 80 years. The plaintiffs do not allege that any part of the physical monument is “gone.” The only complaint is that the building has been occupied at times by persons or agencies, who are respectable as far as we know, but not city officers. There is no reason to suppose that a court will be furthering the purpose of maintaining the monument by forfeiting the property to plaintiffs who are the statutory trustees of the dissolved grantor corporation, and would take the property for the benefit of the creditors, if any, and the stock-holders.
Riner, C. J., concurs.