Coxe v. State

• Decision Date: 15 January 1895
• Citation: 39 N.E. 400,144 N.Y. 396
• Parties: COXE v. STATE.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

144 N.Y. 396

39 N.E. 400

COXE

v.STATE.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Jan. 15, 1895.

Appeal from board of claims.

Proceeding by Macgrane Coxe, as receiver, etc., of the Marsh-Land Company, to recover a claim due from the state of New York. From an award of the board of claims in favor of the state, claimant appeals. Reversed.

Julien T. Davies, E. B. Hinsdale, and Byron Traver, for appellant.

G. D. B. Hasbrouck, for respondent.

O'BRIEN, J.

The claimant, as receiver of a corporation known as the Marsh-Land Company, sought to recover from the state the sum of $25,000, with interest from April 13, 1876. On a trial before the board of claims, it has been decided that this claim is not a valid one, and an award was accordingly made in favor of the state. The most important question in the case is whether the claimant, or the corporation which he represents, ever had a just claim for the recovery of this sum, or any part of it, in law or equity. This question depends upon the validity and effect of certain statutes enacted by the legislature.

The Marsh-Land Company was incorporated by force of chapter 864 of the Laws of 1868, as amended by chapter 282 of the Laws of 1869. These statutes conferred powers, in addition to those usually possessed by corporations, of the most important and extensive character. The act was entitled ‘An act to authorize the drainage of marsh lands.’ After providing that certain persons named, and their successors, should become a corporation, with the usual powers, and providing for its government and management, and the amount of its capital stock, it was enacted that the corporation should have power to reclaim and drain, from time to time, as should appear expedient, all or any portion of the wet or overflowed lands and tide-water marshes on or adjacent to Staten Island and Long Island, except such portions of the same as were included within the corporate limits of any city, and to construct, maintain, and use all dykes, dams, ditches, drains, sluices, engines, pumps, and other works necessary or convenient for that purpose. Power was also given to enter upon all lands and waters for the purpose of making surveys and locating the dykes and other works, and, when the same was determined upon, to deposit in the office of the secretary of state a map and survey of such route and locations, and then ‘to use and own the right and title of the state in and to all the lands under water that may lie within or between said dykes and the present shore line,’ upon the payment into the treasury of the state of such sum of money as should be determined, by a commission to be appointed by the governor, to be the fair value of such lands under water, belonging to the state. The corporation accepted the powers and franchises conferred by the act, and complied with all of its provisions necessary in order to become vested with the title to the lands contemplated by the grant. It filed the maps and surveys locating the dykes, and applied to the governor for the appointment of the commissioners to determine the amount to be paid to the state; and they reported to the secretary of state that they had valued the lands under water belonging to the state, included between the dykes and the established line of riparian owners, as shown by the maps, at $25,000. The corporation paid this amount into the state treasury on the 16th of December, 1871, and received from the treasurer the certificate provided for by the act, which was recorded in the several counties in which the lands were situated. The boundaries of the lands under water thus granted were not defined in the act; but the corporation had power to locate the dykes at pleasure, and indicate the location upon the map, and thereupon whatever lands were included between the dykes and the shore line vested in the corporation. The act, if valid, thus empowered the corporation the become vested with the title to such portions of the land under the water of the sea and the Sound as it chose to designate upon the maps, within the limits of the counties of Kings, Queens, Richmond, and Suffolk, except the city of Brooklyn, which was then the only incorporated city in those four counties. The full history of this legislation, and the causes which led to its enactment, do not, of course, appear in the record; and it is quite impossible to conjecture, whether from the language of the act itself, or from any light that we now have, what real purpose or what latent project was in view. All we know is that, soon after it had been passed, its full scope and effect was seen, probably by some of the property owners on the shore, and it became the subject of investigation by the legislature. The judiciary committee of the senate, to whom the matter had been referred, reported in regard to its passage, and to its effect upon the rights of the state and the owners of lands upon the shore, and expressed in strong language a very unfavorable opinion with respect to the validity and propriety of the legislation. The matter was finally referred to the attorney general, who responded in an elaborate opinion, containing views equally unfavorable, but declining to interfere, for reasons which he stated, and, among them, the fact that the validity of the act could be tested in the courts by the private parties whose property was affected.

It should also be observed that this statute, in addition to the powers already referred to, authorized the corporation to cause assessments to be made upon private property claimed to be benefited, without any provision for notice to the owners, and to exercise the right of eminent domain in such way as to leave the sections conferring these powers open to very grave objections. By chapter 257 of the Laws of 1875, the legislature repealed all those sections of the act which conferred the power to carry on its operations of draining and reclaiming and to acquire the title to the lands under water, or to levy assessments, or exercise the power of eminent domain, together with the amendatory act of 1869. This legislation did not in terms extinguish the corporation, but it was completely shorn of all its powers and franchises, and nothing was left but a mere skeleton, with corporate life. The title of this repealing act, after referring to the provisions repealed, states that it was also for the repayment of moneys paid into the state treasury, but the only direct provision on that subject, which appears in the body of the act, is one which empowered the commissionersof the land office ‘to examine any claim for damages of said company founded on amounts actually expended and liabilities actually incurred under said act and to report thereon to the next legislature.’ This legislation evidently put an end to all the operations of the company. The officers and managers themselves seemed to have been appalled at the extravagant magnitude of the grant under the acts which had been repealed, as they made no question in the courts as to the right to recall it. On the contrary, they acquiesced, and accepted the provisions made for compensation by filing with the commissioners of the land office, on the 13th of April, 1876, a claim for upwards of $350,000, including the item of $25,000 in question. At a meeting of the commissioners, held about a month afterwards, the claim was laid upon the table, and no further action was ever after taken upon it by that body, with a view to its adjustment or payment, although from time to time it was the subject of application to the legislature for relief. The subsequent history of the claim, however, belongs to another part of this discussion. What has thus far been stated is quite sufficient to enable us to get a clear view of the merits of the claim, so far as this item is concerned, as between the corporation and the state, at the time when it was filed. The learned trial court has held that under the act of 1868 the company became vested with the title and ownership of the lands under water, outside the shore line of these four counties, as designated upon the maps; that the title thus acquired was not affected by the repealing act of 1875, and, still holding the title to the lands, the company or its representative has no claim against the state for the money paid into the treasury as the consideration for the grant. Of course, if the premises from which the reasoning of the court proceeded are accepted as correct, the conclusion is so obviously sound and just as scarcely to admit of any discussion. It is plain that the claimant ought to have either the money or the land, and, if the validity of the grant could be confirmed by the judgment of this court, it would doubtless be of immensely more value than any mere money claim involved. But we think that so far as the statutes referred to attempted to confer title to such a vast domain, which the state held for the benefit of the public, they were absolutely void, as in conflict with the constitution of the state and of the United States. The objections to the legislation are many and grave, but I will not attempt to elaborate them all.

There is nothing in the enactments to indicate that the grant was for any public purpose, and none has been suggested; and, if it could be upheld, it is obvious that such a result would establish the principle that a majority in the legislature is competent to convey to a private corporation, for private purposes, the land under all the tide waters within the jurisdiction of the state. The nature of the title, and the power of the sovereign to alienate lands under tide waters, have been a prolific source of judicial discussion from the earliest times; and, judging from the numerous recent decisions, the subject is still almost as fresh as ever. This is due mainly to the circumstance that the courts have never yet attempted to fix the precise limits of legislative power in that regard. It is very difficult, and...