Brown v. Spreckels
| Decision Date | 29 August 1902 |
| Citation | 14 Haw. 399 |
| Parties | CHARLES A. BROWN v. JOHN D. SPRECKELS AND ADOLPH B. SPRECKELS, PARTNERS UNDER THE NAME OF J. D. SPRECKELS BROS., AND A. G. SERRAO, D. LYCURGUS, S. C. GUERERA, W. C. BORDEN, W. K. AKANA, WING SING, KWONG WA KEE, C. AHO, PETER MIGUEL, TANG SING AND MRS. JOHN UTTERSTROM. CHARLES A. BROWN v. J. D. SPRECKELS AND ADOLPH B. SPRECKELS, PARTNERS UNDER THE NAME OF J. D. SPRECKELS Bros., AND KUM LEONG, SANG CHUN, MARIA NIAU, AH PING AND J. CAMERON. |
| Court | Hawaii Supreme Court |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
EXCEPTIONS FROM CIRCUIT COURT, FOURTH CIRCUIT.
Syllabus by the Court
Parol evidence is inadmissible to vary or contradict the terms of a deed, as, for instance, to show that the survey notes made one distance longer than that described in the deed.
Evidence is inadmissible to show the usual meaning of ordinary words, as, for instance, the broader popular or the narrower legal meaning of the word “beach”. The Courts take judicial notice of such meanings.
The beach between high and low water marks could be granted to private persons before the annexation of these islands to the United States.
Even if the law were now different, titles to beach property previously acquired would remain valid.
Crown lands were alienable by the King in 1853.
Accretion belongs to the littoral proprietor.
A description in a deed, first by monuments, one boundary being represented as adjoining or coinciding with the edge or the shore of the sea; then by courses and distances, which apparently do not go quite to high water mark, and finally by a diagram representing the space between the land as described by courses and distances and the sea as “beach”, carried title to high water mark at least.
The words “with the right of extension to low water mark” added to a specific description of certain land near the sea, carry the fee to the land in front of the specifically described land, so far as the grantor has the fee.
As a rule land cannot be appurtenant to land.
In construing a deed, the court will, in order to give effect to the intention of the parties, construe a word in a popular or technical or purely arbitrary sense, provided the intended sense can be ascertained in a legal manner. Ordinarily the ordinary meaning will be given to a word, but that it was used in some other sense may be shown by the context, or by proof that it had a different meaning in the particular trade or locality, or, in case of a latent ambiguity, by parol evidence of the special circumstances of the case.
The word “beach” may be used in a legal sense as meaning the space between high and low water marks or in a popular sense as including more or less land according to the circumstances, above high water mark.
When a deed described certain land by courses and distances and then added, “And also the sea beach in front of the same down to low water mark,” and the particularly described land extended nearly to high water mark and the land between was of little value and was used in connection with the rest and no reason appeared for not including it or for granting the beach between high and low water marks alone, and possession of the strip between was taken by the grantee without question, it was error to direct a nonsuit on the ground that the word “beach” had a fixed legal meaning covering the space between high and low water marks alone.
J. A. Magoon, T. I. Dillan, Holmes & Stanley, and Smith & Parsons for the plaintiff.
Kinney, Ballou & McClanahan for the defendants.
FREAR, C.J., PERRY, J., AND L. A. DICKEY, ESQ., OF THE BAR, IN PLACE OF GALBRAITH, J., DISQUALIFIED.
These two actions of ejectment were tried together in the Circuit Court and argued together in this Court. They are for accretions on the water front at Hilo, Hawaii. One piece is covered by the second action and two pieces by the first, but only two titles are involved, the two pieces last mentioned being covered by one title, and the chains of title are in part the same for all three pieces.
Front street runs nearly parallel with and not far from the sea shore at Hilo. Waianuenue and King streets run at right angles to Front street, one block apart, King street being on the Southeasterly or Puna side of Waianuenue street. One title covers the land above Front street between Waianuenue and King streets; the other covers land above Front street, but on the other or Puna side of King street. The question in these actions is whether these titles cover the land, mostly accretion, below Front street, that is, between Front street and the sea, in front of the pieces on the upper side of that street.
The chain of title to the land between Waianuenue and King streets, known as the Bates land, is in part as follows: Deed from King Kamehameha III to Elizabeth G. J. Bates, September 19, 1853; deed from Elizabeth G. J. Bates and Asher B. Bates, her husband, to Benjamin Pitman, July 3, 1858. The chain of title to the other piece, known as the Kalaeloa land, is in part as follows: Land Commission Award 4894, April 18, 1851, to Kalaeloa, followed by Royal Patent 1144, July 7, 1853; deed from Kalaeloa and Hanae, his wife, to Benjamin Pitman, not dated, but acknowledged August 28, and September 18, 1854. The chains of title, thus united, continue as follows: Devise by Benjamin Pitman to Martha B. Pitman, his wife, by will dated March 4, 1880, probated March 27, 1888; deed from Martha B. Pitman to the plaintiff, Charles A. Brown, August 2, 1899.
There seems to be no dispute as to the plaintiff's paper titles. The only question is how much they cover. The defendants offered no evidence, but relied wholly on the weakness of the plaintiff's case, and at the close of the plaintiff's case moved for a nonsuit, which was granted in each case, on the ground that the plaintiff had failed to show that his titles covered the lands in dispute. The plaintiff brings the cases here on three exceptions, two to the refusal to admit offered testimony and one to the order of nonsuit. The first two exceptions relate to the Bates land only and will be considered first.
The deed from Kamehameha III to Mrs. Bates describes the portion of the Bates land, or most of it, above Front street by courses and distances and monuments, and then adds the following: “And also the sea beach in front of the same down to low water mark.” The defendants contended that the word “beach” has a fixed legal meaning, namely, the shore between high and low water marks, and that there was a strip between high water mark and the part described by metes and bounds which did not pass under the deed. The plaintiff contended that the word “beach” was used in its broader popular sense and that it included the strip just mentioned. At the time of the deed from Kamehameha III the sea ran in much farther than it does at present, the land was of little value, the consideration for the 2.756 acres being only $100, and Front street, perhaps then not known by that or any other name, though it appears to have been known by that name within a year afterwards, was little more than a path or trail. The front line of the portion of the land described by metes and bounds did not coincide with the present upper side of Front street but ran diagonally up from King street to Waianuenue street, striking the latter street about a chain above the present corner of that street and Front street. This is accounted for by the defendants on the theory that the tendency under those early conditions was to go across or cut off corners as much as possible for convenience, and that Front street then slanted up as it approached Waianuenue street and that consequently the description in the deed was made to cover only what was above Front street as it then ran. The plaintiff contended that the description in the deed was intended to extend to the present line of Front street but that by mistake one side, that on Waianuenue street was made too short by one chain, and so he offered to prove that that side was one chain longer in the original survey notes than in the deed. The first exception was to the refusal of the court to permit him to do this.
No error was committed in excluding the survey notes. They were offered merely for the purpose of showing that the length of one side was longer in the survey notes than in the deed, that is, for the purpose of varying or contradicting the deed. Parol evidence is inadmissible for the purpose of varying or contradicting the terms of a deed. The survey notes were not offered for the purpose of explaining a latent ambiguity. We presume they would have been inadmissible even if they had been offered for that purpose, for, although there may be a latent ambiguity in another portion of the deed, there was none in the portion with reference to which the notes were offered. It may be added that there was nothing on the face of the notes to connect them with this deed, and the only testimony relied on was that of a brother of the surveyor, which was very indefinite, and the field notes and deed differ in respect of every course and distance as well as in other important respects.
The second exception was to the refusal of the court to allow the plaintiff to ask a witness, “what is your opinion, as a surveyor, as to what the word beach means in this country?” In view of what we shall say in regard to the next exception and our conclusion thereon, it will not be necessary to say much in regard to this exception. If the intention was to show that the word “beach” is used in this country in the broader popular sense as well as in the narrower legal sense, the testimony was properly excluded, for the reason that evidence is not needed or competent to prove usual meanings of ordinary words. Courts take judicial notice of such meanings. If the intention was to show that the word was used in this country in a peculiar sense different from its ordinary sense, testimony of...
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