Bolles Wooden Ware Co v. United States

• Decision Date: 18 December 1882
• Citation: 1 S.Ct. 398,106 U.S. 432,27 L.Ed. 230
• Parties: E. E. BOLLES WOODEN WARE CO. v. UNITED STATES
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

106 U.S. 432

1 S.Ct. 398

27 L.Ed. 230

E. E. BOLLES WOODEN WARE CO. v. UNITED STATES.

December 18, 1882.

S. D. Hastings, Jr., for plaintiff in error.

Asst. Atty. Gen. Maury, for defendant in error.

MILLER, J.

This is a writ of error to the circuit court for the eastern district of Wisconsin, founded on a certificate of division of opinion between the judgee holding that court. The facts, as certified, out of which this difference of opinion arose appear in an action in the nature of trover, brought by the United States for the value of 242 cords of ash timber, or wood suitable for manufacturing purposes, cut and removed from that part of the public lands known as the reservation of the Oneida tribe of Indians, in the state of Wisconsin. This timber was knowingly and wrongfully taken from the land by Indians, and carried by them some distance to the town of Depere, and there sold to the defendant, which was not chargeable with any intentional wrong or misconduct or bad faith in the purchase. The timber on the ground, after it was felled, was worth 25 cents per cord, or $60.71 for the whole, and, at the town of Depere, where defendant bought and received it, $3.50 per cord, or $850 for the whole quantity. The question on which the judges divided was whether the liability of the defendant should be measured by the first or the last of these valuations. It was the opinion of the circuit judge that the latter was the proper rule of damages, and judgment was rendered against the defendant for that sum. We cannot follow counsel for the plaintiff in error through the examination of all the cases, both in England and this country, which his commendable research has enabled him to place upon the brief. In the English courts the decisions have in the main grown out of coal taken from the mine, and in such cases the principle seems to be established in those courts that when suit is brought for the value of the coal so taken, and it has been the result of an honest mistake as to the true ownership of the mine, and the taking was not a willful trespass, the rule of damages is the value of the coal as it was in the mine before it was disturbed, and not its value when dug out and delivered at the mouth of the mine. Martin v. Porter, 5 Mess. & W. 351; Morgan v. Powell, 3 Adol. & E. (N. S.) 278; Wood v. Morewood, 3 Adol. & E. 440; Hilton v. Woods, L. R. 4 Eq. 438; Jegon v. Vivian, L. R. 6 Ch. App. 760.

The doctrine of the English courts on this subject is probably as well stated by Lord HATHERLY in the house of lords, in the case of Livingston v. Rawyards Coal Co. L. R. 5 App. Cas. 33, as anywhere else. He said:

'There is no doubt that if a man furtively, and in bad faith, robs his neighbor of his property, and because it is underground is probably for some little time not detected, the court of equity in this country will struggle, or I would rather say, will assert its authority, to punish the fraud by fixing the person with the value of the whole of the property which he has so furtively taken, and making him no allowance in respect of what he has so done, as would have been justly made to him if the parties had been working by agreement.' But 'when once we arrive at the fact that an inadvertence has been the cause of the misfortune, then the simple course is to make every just allowance for outlay on the part of the person who has so acquired the property, and to give back to the owner, so far as is possible under the circumstances of the case, the full value of that which cannot be restored to him in specie.'

There seems to us to be no doubt that in the case of a willful trespass the rule as stated above is the law of damages both in England and in this country, though in some of the state courts the milder rule has been applied even to this class of cases. Such are some that are cited from Wisconsin. Single v. Schneider, 24 Wis. 299; Weymouth v. Railroad Co. 17 Wis. 567. On the other hand, the weight of authority in this country as well as in England favors the doctrine that where the trespass is the result of inadvertence or mistake, and the wrong was not intentional, the value of the property when first taken must govern, or if the conversion sued for was after value had been added to it by the work of the defendant, he should be credited with this addition. Winchester v. Craig, 33 Mich. 205, contains a full examination of the authorities on the point. Heard v. James, 49 Miss. 236; Baker v. Wheeler, 8 Wend. 505; Baldwin v. Porter, 12 Conn. 484. While these principles are sufficient to enable us to fix a measure of damages in both classes of torts where the original trespasser is defendant, there remains a third class where a purchaser from him is sued, as in this case, for the conversion of the property to his own use. In such case, if the first taker of the property were guilty of no willful wrong, the rule can in no case be more stringent against the...