Converse v. Udall
| Decision Date | 30 November 1966 |
| Docket Number | Civ. No. 65-581,65-590. |
| Citation | 262 F. Supp. 583 |
| Parties | Ford M. CONVERSE, Plaintiff, v. Stewart L. UDALL, Secretary of the Interior, Defendant. INDEPENDENT QUICK SILVER CO., an Oregon corporation, Plaintiff, v. Stewart L. UDALL, Secretary of the Interior, Defendant. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of Oregon |
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William B. Murray, Portland, Or., for plaintiffs.
Jack G. Collins, First Asst. U. S. Atty., and Sidney I. Lezak, U. S. Atty., Portland, Or., for defendant.
FACTS IN GENERAL
These cases are considered together, as they present many common questions of law and fact. The chain of events culminating in this review began with two hearings in Portland, United States v. Converse (Contest No. O11195-D) and United States v. Independent Quick Silver Co. (Contest No. O6189-A). The hearings were initiated by the Forest Service, United States Department of Agriculture, pursuant to Section 5 of the Act of July 23, 1955, 69 Stat. 369, as amended, 30 U.S.C. § 613 (Supp. 1965).
The statute, popularly known as the Surface Resources Act, provided in general that rights under any mining claim located after July 23, 1955, the date of the Act's passage, would be subject to the right of the United States to manage and dispose of surface resources other than mineral deposits. It also provided that no mining claim located after that date could be used, prior to the issuance of a patent, for purposes other than prospecting, mining and processing. The purpose of this statute was not to abolish mining claims or to significantly alter mining law, but to limit the use, or misuse, of surface resources (such as timber or peat) by a mining claimant prior to the issuance of a patent, and it applies only to mining claims located after July 23, 1955.
Consequently, if a mining claim was in all respects valid prior to July 23, 1955, it was not subject to the right of the United States to manage and dispose of its surface resources. But because a mining claim is not considered valid until (a) the boundaries of the claim are marked and until (b) a discovery of a valuable mineral deposit has been made, it became necessary in many instances to make investigations and hold hearings to determine whether or not both of these prerequisites were met prior to the date of the Act's passage. The Act contained detailed provisions for these proceedings.1 It was pursuant to these provisions that the two hearings here in question took place.
The first hearing, United States v. Converse, transpired June 11, 1962, and involved two mining claims.2 The second hearing, United States v. Independent Quick Silver Co., took place October 1, 1962, and involved twenty-two mining claims.3 Both of these hearings were presided over by Graydon E. Holt, hearing examiner for the Bureau of Land Management, who was then stationed at Sacramento, California.
At the Converse hearing, the mining claimant Converse filed a motion to change the hearing examiner and filed an affidavit in support of that motion, charging the hearing examiner with bias and prejudice. The motion was denied because not timely filed, and the hearing continued. From the evidence adduced at the hearing, Hearing Examiner Holt concluded that the most favorable finding which could be made for the mining claimant was that there was sufficient evidence of mineralization to induce a prudent man to retain the claims until a road had been constructed and until more extensive exploration had been completed, but that there was not sufficient evidence of mineralization, as of July 23, 1955, to induce a prudent man to expend labor and means on either the Paymaster or Edith Lode claims with a reasonable expectation of developing a valuable mine. As a result, these two mining claims were held not to have been validated prior to passage of the Surface Resources Act, and were found to be subject to the limitations and restrictions of that Act.
This determination did not directly affect the mining claims themselves. The mining claimant still had the right to use the claims for mining purposes, and for any other purpose incidental to mining. The adverse determination to mining claimant Converse only precluded him from using the surface resources (including the timber of the claims, which the parties stipulated to have a value of $91,038.61) in a manner not incidental to mining, and made the claims subject to the right of the government to manage the surface resources, until a patent was obtained.
Following administrative regulations, claimant Converse appealed the decision of Hearing Examiner Holt to the Director of the Bureau of Land Management. He contended in substance that: a fair hearing was impossible because the examiner was prejudiced and had prejudged the case; he was entitled to a jury trial, and the administrative hearing was a deprivation of property without due process of law; the government had failed to establish a prima facie case, and he had affirmatively showed that a discovery had been made on each of the claims; the hearing examiner erred in holding that assays of ore samples taken by the mining claimant after July 23, 1955, were inadmissible, while those taken by the contestant after the same date were admissible; and, the government's witnesses did not fairly sample portions of the claims alleged to have been opened prior to 1955.
On October 8, 1963, the Assistant Director, Bureau of Land Management, affirmed the decision of Hearing Examiner Holt. Claimant Converse then appealed to the Secretary of the Interior, reiterating essentially the same arguments that were contained in his appeal to the Director of the Bureau of Land Management, and adding the contentions that the Director erred in holding that "exploration and development," as used in mining laws are not synonymous, and that the Director either ignored or refused to accept the facts found by the hearing examiner. On March 26, 1965, the decision of the Assistant Director was affirmed by Ernest F. Hom, Assistant Solicitor of the Interior, pursuant to authority delegated by the Secretary of the Interior.
UNITED STATES v. INDEPENDENT QUICK SILVER CO.
Five days prior to the Independent Quick Silver Co. hearing, the mining claimant mailed a motion for change of hearing examiner, together with a supporting affidavit, charging bias, to Hearing Examiner Holt at his Sacramento office. The claimant argued that this was the first date that it knew Holt was going to hear the matter, but the claimant had been in correspondence with Holt, regarding the case, for some seven months prior to the hearing. This motion was denied by Hearing Examiner Holt at the outset of the hearing, on the grounds that the motion had not been timely filed as required by 5 U.S.C. § 1006(a). The hearing then continued, and revolved around the charges that there had been no valuable mineral discovery on any of the twenty-two claims prior to July 23, 1955, and that the boundaries of the claims had not been distinctly marked on the ground. Hearing Examiner Holt held that, with respect to the Bonanza claim, a valuable mineral deposit had been found and that the claimant was entitled to surface rights on that claim. Regarding the other twenty-one claims, he found that the government had established a prima facie case in support of the two charges, which had not been refuted by the claimant. As a result, these twenty-one mining claims were held subject to the restrictions of the Surface Resources Act. Regarding the charge that the boundaries of the claims had not been distinctly marked on the ground, the hearing examiner found that the evidence indicated that there were only two known corner posts for the twenty-two claims involved.
Both the government and Independent Quick Silver Co. appealed from this determination by the hearing examiner. Independent Quick Silver argued that: the hearing examiner erred in failing to grant its motion for change of hearing examiner; the hearing was a denial of due process and equal protection, and a taking of property without just compensation; the government failed to establish a prima facie case in support of the charges listed in the notice of hearing; the hearing examiner should have allowed its motion to exclude all of the assay reports of the government which were taken after 1955; it was proven by a preponderance of the evidence that discoveries existed on each of the claims involved; and, the examiner erred in failing to adopt certain of its requested findings of fact. The United States, in its appeal, argued that the hearing examiner had correctly found twenty-one of the claims subject to the limitations of the Surface Resources Act, but that the hearing examiner erred in failing to restrict the mining claimant's surface rights on a portion of the Bonanza claim after finding that the boundaries of that claim were not distinctly marked on the ground, and in finding that a discovery of a valuable mineral deposit had been made on a portion of the Bonanza claim.
On June 23, 1964, James F. Doyle, Chief of the Office of Appeals and Hearings of the Bureau of Land Management, affirmed the decision of Hearing Examiner Holt insofar as he held that the twenty-one claims were subject to the restrictions of the Surface Resources Act. The hearing examiner's determination that the Bonanza claim was not subject to the restrictions of the Act was reversed, however, and the government's assertions on appeal were adopted. Independent Quick Silver Co. then appealed this decision to the Secretary of the Interior, as provided for in the administrative regulations. On September 21, 1965, the decision of Doyle was affirmed in all respects by Ernest F. Hom, Assistant Solicitor of the Department of the Interior, pursuant to authority delegated by the Secretary of the Interior.
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Converse v. Udall
...Interior. The Secretary's decision is reported at 72 Interior Dec. 141 (1965); that of the District Court is reported in Converse v. Udall, D.Or., 1966, 262 F. Supp. 583. This opinion assumes familiarity with those decisions. We affirm. In 1955 (P.L. 167, 69 Stat. ch. 375, p. 367) Congress ......
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