Higueras v. United States

• Decision Date: 01 December 1866
• Citation: 5 Wall. 827,18 L.Ed. 469,72 U.S. 827
• Parties: HIGUERAS v. UNITED STATES. 1
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

72 U.S. 827

18 L.Ed. 469

5 Wall. 827

HIGUERAS v. UNITED STATES.¹

December Term, 1866

APPEAL from the District Court for Northern California.

Mr. Bradley, for the appellants; Mr. Willes, contra.

Mr. Justice CLIFFORD delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an appeal from a decree of the District Court of the United States for the Northern District of Colifornia, confirming the survey of a private land claim. Appeals in such cases are authorized by the fifth section of the act of the fourteenth of June, 1860, if applied for within six months after the date of the decree, and it is under that special provision that the present controversy is now before the court.

I. 1. Original claimant acquired a possessory right to the tract of land situate in Santa Clara County, California, and called Tularcitos, on the fourth of October, 1821, by virtue of a decree of concession of that date made to him by the governor of the Territory. Directions of the decree of concession were that the applicant for the tract should be put in possession of the same by the commissioner of San Jose, in whose jurisdiction the land was situated. Measurements were to be made and monuments fixed on the four sides of the tract, and the officer designated to perform the duty was to make return of his doings to the government. Pursuant to those directions the commissioner attended to the duty assigned to him and made his return, in which he states that he went upon the tract and gave possession to the donee, designating the number of varas allowed on each of the four sides of the concession.

Claim to a portion of the tract it seems was subsequently made by an adjoining proprietor, and on the seventeenth day of October, 1835, the original claimant presented to the governor of the Territory a second petition, in which he requested that the boundaries of the concession to him might be enlarged, and that his title to the former concession might be confirmed. He based the claim in the second application chiefly upon two grounds: 1. That he had been in the occupation of the tract for more than twelve years. 2. That a part of the tract embraced in the decree of concession had been granted to another person.

2. Second decree of concession granted the augmentation, as requested, and directed that the same should be considered as annexed to the former concession. Annexed to the petition was a diseno describing the entire tract, which appears to have been made in strict conformity to the colonization laws. Remark should be made that the first concession did not profess to grant anything more than a possessory right, and the second espediente is without the formal title, but there can be no doubt that the several documents are sufficient to give to the donee an inchoate right to the tract, within the meaning of the treaty of cession and the act of Congress subsequently passed to carry the provisions of the treaty into effect.²

Such also were the views of the land commissioners appointed under that act of Congress, as appears by their decree confirming the claim.

Description of the tract as given in the decree of confirmation is that it is situated in Santa Clara County and is the same land formerly occupied by Jose Higuera, now deceased, and is known by the name of Los Tularcitos. Boundaries given in the decree are as follows: Beginning at the back side of the principal house on said rancho, standing at the foot of the hill, and running thence northwardly to a lone tree on the top of the sierra (which tree is known as a landmark), thence east along the sierra to the line of the land known as the rancho of Jose Maria Alviso, thence southerly along the west line of said Alviso's rancho till it intersects the Arroyo de la Penetencia, thence up said arroyo to an estuary, and from that point to the place of beginning.

3. Appeal was duly taken from that decree by the United States, but the appeal, on the motion of the district attorney, was subsequently dismissed, and on his motion also it was ordered, adjudged, and decreed that the claimants have leave to proceed under the decree as a final decree in their favor. No appeal was subsequently taken, and the decree, therefore, became and is the final decree in the case. Final decrees in such cases, if regularly made and duly entered in the record, are conclusive between the United States and the claimants, unless an appeal is seasonably taken from the decree according to law.³

4. Confirmation alone, however, did not, under that act, confer upon the claimant a right to a patent, but it was made the duty of the surveyor-general to cause all private land claims finally confirmed to be accurately surveyed, and to furnish plats of the same; and the provision was that a patent should issue to the claimant upon his presenting to the General Land Office an authentic certificate of such confirmation and a plat or survey of the land, duly certified and approved by the surveyor-general.

Such was the legal effect of a final confirmation of a private land claim under the act of Congress first passed to carry the treaty of cession into effect, and such also was the legal course of proceeding under that act to procure a patent.

5. But authority was conferred upon the District Courts for the Northern and Southern Districts of California, under the second section of the subsequent act, to which reference has been made, upon the application of any party interested, to make an order requiring any survey of a private land claim, within their respective districts, to be returned into such court for examination and adjudication; and if, upon the hearing of the allegations and proofs, the court should be of opinion that the survey and location were erroneous, the court, in that event, was authorized to set it aside and annul the same, or to correct and modify it. Proofs are to be taken and the parties have a right to be heard, and thereupon the court is required 'to render judgment thereon.'

Survey of the tract in this case was made by the surveyor-general, and on the seventh day of June, 1859, the court, on motion of the claimants, made an order directing the plat of the survey to be returned into court. Whereupon the claimants filed three exceptions to the survey, which in substance and effect are as follows: 1. That the survey was not made in accordance with the decree of confirmation. 2. That according to the decree of confirmation and the evidence in the case, the northern and southern lines of the survey should be extended easterly to the sierra or main range of mountains, so as to include the tract of country known as the Valley of the Calaveras. 3. That the northern line, extending from the estuary to the Calera Creek, should be a straight line instead of an angle, as represented on the plat. Testimony was taken, but before the hearing the claimants filed an additional exception, describing the tract of country mentioned in the second exception, and claiming that the lines of the survey should be extended as therein specified, so as to embrace that whole tract. Additional testimony was then taken and the parties were heard, and after the hearing the several exceptions were overruled, and a decree entered that the 'survey be, and the same is hereby confirmed.' Claimants asked for a rehearing, which was granted, but the court refused to modify the decree, and ordered that it stand as the final decree in the cause. Present appeal is from that decree, and the questions for decision are those presented in the exceptions to the survey and location, as the same were filed by the claimants.

II. 1. Appellants insist, as a primary proposition, that the boundaries of the tract, as given in the decree, are so indefinite and incongruous that the decree cannot be carried into effect, and consequently that they have a right in this proceeding to prove the extent of the tract as formerly occupied by the original claimant, so that the court may determine the true location and correct the errors in the decree of confirmation. But no such authority is to be found in the act conferring jurisdiction over the surveys of private land claims, nor in any other act of Congress upon that subject. Survey is required of all private land claims finally confirmed. Such claims are required to be accurately surveyed, which is equivalent to a requirement that the survey, where the decree of confirmation is by metes and bounds, shall conform to the decree.

Private land claims, such as are recognized in that act, are those which arise by virtue of a right or title derived from the Spanish or Mexican government. Every person claiming such lands in California was required to present his claim to the land commissioners for adjudication, and the provision was that all land the claims to which should be finally decided to be invalid, and all lands the claims to which...