Hibbard v. Halliday

• Decision Date: 13 June 1916
• Docket Number: Case Number: 6594,Case Number: 6595
• Citation: 1916 OK 649,158 P. 1158,58 Okla. 244
• Parties: HIBBARD v. HALLIDAY.
• Court: Oklahoma Supreme Court

1916 OK 649

158 P. 1158

58 Okla. 244

HIBBARD v. HALLIDAY.

Case Number: 6594

Case Number: 6595

Supreme Court of Oklahoma

Decided: June 13, 1916

Syllabus

¶0 1. PROPERTY--Nature of Right--Limitations. Property in land must be considered, for many purposes, not as an absolute, unrestricted dominion, but as an aggregation of qualified privileges, the limits of which are prescribed by the equality of rights and the correlation of rights and obligations necessary for the highest enjoyment of land by the entire community of proprietors.

2. SAME. The right to use one's own property for the sole purpose of maliciously injuring another is not one of the immediate and indestructible rights of ownership.

3. TORTS--Willful Acts. At the common law there was a cause of action whenever one person did damage to another willfully and intentionally and without just cause or excuse.

4. ADJOINING LANDOWNERS--Nuisance--Pleading--Petition. A petition in an action for damages for the malicious construction and maintenance of a high brick wall on the line between adjoining lot owners, in which it is alleged in effect that the defendant erected said wall and has since maintained and now maintains the same, without advantage to himself and without intent to benefit himself in any legal manner, but erected and has maintained the same maliciously and for the sole purpose of injuring the plaintiff in and about the use, occupation, and enjoyment of said premises and the value of the same, and that by the erection and maintenance of said wall said plaintiff has been deprived of light and air, which has resulted in pecuniary damage to him, states facts sufficient to constitute a cause of action against the defendant.

Error from District Court, Muskogee County; R. P. de Graffenried, Judge.

Action by John S. Halliday against Harry Hibbard. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendant brings error. Affirmed.

William T. Hutchings, for plaintiff in error.

Owen & Stone and Guy F. Nelson, for defendant in error.

KANE, C. J.

¶1 This was an action for damages, commenced by the defendant in error, plaintiff below, against the plaintiff in error, defendant below. Upon trial to a jury there was a verdict for the plaintiff, to reverse which this proceeding in error was commenced. Hereafter the parties will be designated as "plaintiff" and "defendant," respectively, as they appeared in the trial court.

¶2 It seems that the parties to this action are owners of adjoining lots situated on Okmulgee avenue, in the city of Muskogee. During the summer and fall of 1908, the plaintiff completed a flat on his lots consisting of eight apartments with twelve windows on the west side overlooking adjoining lots of the defendant. At the time the flat was completed there was an unobstructed view from the windows on the west side, and the unobstructed windows also afforded light and air for the plaintiff and his tenants who occupied apartments on the west side of the flat. The plaintiff in his petition states his cause of action against the defendant as follows:

"That in the month of November, 1908, and after plaintiff's said flat building was practically completed and after said windows above mentioned were made and left, defendant, without the consent of plaintiff and against his will and without making any compensation to plaintiff for damages which plaintiff would and did sustain, erected a solid brick wall on the line between the said premises of plaintiff and defendant or on defendant's said premises in close proximity to said line, and within six or eight inches of the west wall of plaintiff's said flat building; that said wall so erected by defendant is almost the full length of plaintiff's said flat buildings and within a few inches as high and is about thirteen inches thick; that there are no openings in said wall of defendant and that the same shuts out the light and air from plaintiff's said flat building and the windows on the west side thereof.

"Plaintiff further states that defendant erected said wall and has since maintained and now maintains the same without advantage to himself and without intent to benefit himself in any legal manner, but erected and has maintained and now maintains the same maliciously and for the sole purpose of injuring plaintiff in and about the use, occupation and enjoyment of said premises and the value of the same.

"Plaintiff further states that by reason of the erection and maintenance of said wall by defendant as aforesaid plaintiff has been deprived of light and air on the west side of his said flat building; that by reason thereof he has been damaged in the use, occupation, and enjoyment of the apartment in said flat building, occupied by plaintiff and his family as aforesaid in the sum of $ 600; that the rental value of the remaining seven apartments in said flat building has been greatly depreciated by reason of the erection and maintenance of said wall by defendant as aforesaid to the plaintiff's damage in the sum of $ 2,500."

¶3 There was evidence adduced at the trial reasonably tending to establish the allegation of the petition to the effect that the defendant, without advantage to himself and without intention to benefit himself in any legal manner, erected and maintained said wall maliciously and for the sole purpose of injuring the plaintiff in and about the use and occupation and enjoyment of his property, and that by so doing the plaintiff was pecuniarily damaged as alleged.

¶4 Counsel for defendant states his principal contention as follows:

"The plaintiff in error in this case had the lawful right to construct a wall which deprived the defendant in error of light and air; and this is true although done with the intent to injure the defendant in error and without any advantage to himself.

"While we do not concede that the evidence in this case brings the facts within the contention above, and we shall endeavor later on to show that it does not, but we do contend that the law is as above stated, and that although such an extreme case might have existed here, still the law was with the plaintiff in error."

¶5 We do not believe that this contention can be sustained upon principle or by the weight of modern authority.

¶6 We may concede at the outset that at common law no actionable wrong can arise, unless there has been some invasion of another's right; and that the owner of land has a right to make any reasonable use of his property without liability for any loss there may flow to his neighbor from such use; and that a lawful act cannot be actionable, though it proceeded from a malicious motive. A critical examination, however, of some of the many cases cited by counsel in support of their various contentions convinces us that whatever conflict there appears to be in the authorities on the question now before u...