Gulf Oil Corp. v. State Mineral Bd.

• Decision Date: 02 December 1974
• Docket Number: No. 54776,54776
• Citation: 317 So.2d 576
• Parties: GULF OIL CORPORATION v. STATE MINERAL BOARD et al.
• Court: Louisiana Supreme Court

Page 576

317 So.2d 576

GULF OIL CORPORATION v. STATE MINERAL BOARD et al.

No. 54776.

Supreme Court of Louisiana.

Dec. 2, 1974.

On Rehearing July 25, 1975.

Henican, James & Cleveland, C. Ellis Henican, Carl W. Cleveland, New Orleans, for Milner Realty Co., Inc., Louis Carmadelle, Jr., and Gustave Carmadelle, defendants-relators.

William J. Guste, Jr., Atty. Gen., Edward M. Carmouche, Charles Romano, Sp. Asst. Attys. Gen., for defendants-respondents State Mineral Bd. and Register of State Land Office.

Arthur D. Mouton, Wm. H. Mouton, Wm. H. Mouton Law Offices, Lafayette, for amici curiae.

Blake G. Arata, John M. McCollam, Gordon Arata, McCollam & Watters, New Orleans, for amicus curiae.

SANDERS, Chief Justice.

Gulf Oil Corporation deposited a substantial sum of money in the registry of the Twenty-Fifth Judicial District Court and instituted a concursus proceeding to determine the true owner of property which it was leasing. The district court rendered judgment in favor of the State Mineral Board and the Register of the State Land Office.

Milner Realty Co., Inc., Louis Carmadelle, Jr., and Gustave Carmadelle appealed. The Court of Appeal affirmed the judgment of the trial court, decreeing the State of Louisiana the owner of certain water bottoms located in Plaquemines Parish and awarding oil royalty payments to the State Mineral Board. 291 So.2d 807. We granted certiorari to review the judgment of the Court of Appeal. La., 294 So.2d 831.

Milner Realty Co., Inc., Louis Carmadelle, Jr., and Gustave Carmadelle, relators, urge that the Court of Appeal erred in holding that the nullity of a patent of navigable water bottoms was not cured by the lapse of six years, pursuant to Act 62 of 1912 (LSA-R.S. 9:5661), which provides:

'Actions, including those by the State of Louisiana, to annul any patent issued by the state, duly signed by the governor and the register of the state land office, and of record in the state land office, are prescribed by six years, reckoning from the day of the issuance of the patent.'

The State advances several grounds for affirming the judgment of the Court of Appeal. It argues that the private claimants are precluded from maintaining that the property was the bed of a navigable water bottom at the time of the Sheriff's sale to the original patentee on October 29, 1910, or on the date of the alleged patent, citing State v. Scott, 185 So.2d 877 (La.App.1st Cir. 1966). In addition, the State asserts that where a portion of the bed of a navigable body of water is adjudicated to the State for taxes, Article 4, Section 2 of the Louisiana Constitution prohibits a redemption. The State also submits that Act 62 of 1912, the prescriptive statute relied upon by the private claimants, is inapplicable to the patent involved in this proceeding. We are of the opinion that the latter argument is well founded. ¹

It is well settled that prescriptive statutes are stricti juris and will not be extended beyond the letter of the law. Foster v. Breaux, 263 La. 1112, 270 So.2d 526 (1972); Coastal States Gas Producing Co. v. State Mineral Board, 199 So.2d 554 (La.App., 3rd Cir. 1967); Hebert v. Spano, 233 La. 813, 98 So.2d 199 (1957); United Carbon Company v. Mississippi River Fuel Corp., 230 La. 709, 89 So.2d 209 (1956); Hayes v. Levy, 81 So.2d 172 (La.App., 2nd Cir. 1955); Meyer v. Parish of Plaquemines, 11 So.2d 291 (La.App., Orl.Cir. 1942); State v. Stewart Bros. Cotton Co., 193 La. 16, 190 So. 317 (1939).

In United Carbon Company v. Mississippi River Fuel Corp., supra, this Court stated:

'It is equally well settled that prescriptive statutes are strictly construed, and the facts of the case must bring the action clearly within the specific provisions of the law sought to be applied.'

By its terms, Act 62 of 1912 designates the patents to which it applies as those duly signed by the Governor, duly signed by the Register of the State Land Office, and recorded in the State Land Office. The State points out that the patent here was signed neither by the Governor nor the Register of the State Land Office. Nor was it recorded in the State Land Office.

Although the original patent was unavailable for examination, the certified copy of the patent offered into evidence indicates that the original was signed by the Governor. The original patentee, over the State's objection, confirmed that the original was signed by the Governor, but that it had been destroyed. For purposes of this decision, this Court accepts the relators' allegation that it was signed by the Governor. The patent, however, still does not qualify as a prescriptible patent within the intendment of Act 62 of 1912. There is no evidence that the patent was signed by the Register of the State Land Office. Although the private claimants assert that the original patent was signed by I. S. Haspel, President of the Board of Commissions for the Grand Prairie Levee District, that signature is insufficient to bring it within the terms of the statute. The statute specifies the signature of the Register of State Lands. Admittedly, the essential signature did not appear on the document.

Moreover, the contested patent is not registered in the State Land Office. The patent was given to the State Land Office only four or five years before the present suit. The record reflects that it was accepted as supplemental information.

We conclude that Act 62 of 1912 is inapplicable to the present patent, because it was not signed by the Register of the State Land Office nor duly recorded in the State Land Office.

It follows, therefore, that the lower courts were correct in holding that the State of Louisiana is the true owner of the property leased by the Gulf Oil Corporation.

For the reasons assigned, the judgment of the Court of Appeal is affirmed.

BARHAM, J., concurs in result and assigns reasons.

SUMMERS, J., concurs for the reasons assigned.

SUMMERS, Justice (concurring).

Although the law compels me to concur in the Court's opinion, I cannot fail to note the gross injustice of the law in this case, and, very probably, in many others.

Here the landowners' title derives from a sale by the State to the Grand Prairie Levee District in 1905. On authority of the Board of Commissioners of Grand Prairie Levee District it was sold at Sheriff's sale to Millard C. Baker, who also received title to the same land under Patent No. 104 from the State on March 4, 1911. The patent was promptly recorded in the conveyance records of the parish where quent conveyances ended in vesting title in conveyances ended in vesting title in these landowners. Twice the State divested itself of title, and once it enacted a Statute of Repose to set these titles at rest. La.R.S. 9:5661. See California Co. v. Price, 225 La. 706, 74 So.2d 1 (1954).

Now, almost seventy years after the State issued its patent, signed by the Governor, who caused 'the Seal of the State Land Office' to be affixed to that patent, the State is claiming title. The claim is based upon a highly technical deficiency in the patent. Although the patent was signed by the Governor, it was not signed by the 'register of the state land office' as the Statute of Repose requires, even though the seal of the Register is affixed. La.R.S. 9:5661.

Significantly, this tardy assertion of rights by the State is made when the property becomes valuable because of oil discovery. All these years the landowners in the chain of title have paid taxes and exercised the rights of ownership.

In my view the State policy here is little less than confiscation. If my colleagues would agree, I would interpret the affixing of the seal of the State Land Office as a substantial compliance with the Statute of Repose.

I respectfully concur.

BARHAM, Justice (concurring).

We granted writs in this case in order to reconsider the decisions in California Co. v. Price, 225 La. 706, 74 So.2d 1 (1954), and State v. Cenac, 132 So.2d 897 (La.App.1st Cir. 1961), writs refused 241 La. 1055, 132 So.2d 928 (1961). That issue was squarely presented to this Court, and at the time the writ was granted, it was considered to be the dispositive issue. Instead of resolving this important problem, however, the majority has based its judgment on a minor issue of much less significance. I do not disagree with the majority's determination of this minor issue. It is the majority's pretermission of what I consider to be the primary issue in this case with which I take issue. For this reason, I am compelled to concur.

The question of the viability of the Price and Cenac decisions is one of vital importance to the entire state. Many titles are considered to be in jeopardy because of the prevailing feeling of uncertainty as to the eventual outcome of this issue. We owe it to these litigants as well as to potential future litigants to dispose of a question, especially one with such far-reaching ramifications as this one, when it is squarely presented to us. This obligation is not met when, as here, the Court dodges the issue and decides a case on a hypertechnical ground. The function of this Court should be to clarify the law when it is in question; by avoiding a decision on this issue we have instead compounded the existing confusion.

In my opinion, the threshold issue presented for our review, in the context of a reconsideration of the Price and Cenac decisions, is whether the Statute of Repose, Act No. 62 of 1912, affects attempts by the State to grant titles to State-owned navigable water bottoms. I am convinced that the statute was not intended to apply to the case at hand and other similar cases. See concurrence in Carter v. Moore, 258 La. 921, 933, 248 So.2d 813, 817 (1971).

I must respectfully concur.

ON REHEARING

BARHAM, Justice.

The underlying issue in the present litigation is the ownership of the Southwest Quarter (SW 1/4) of Section 26, Township 19 South, Range 18 East in Plaquemines Parish. The land in question is in the Grand Bay area and is...