James v. Germania Iron Co.

• Decision Date: 28 March 1901
• Docket Number: 1,434,1433.
• Citation: 107 F. 597
• Parties: JAMES et al. v. GERMANIA IRON CO. BELDEN v. MIDWAY CO.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eighth Circuit

107 F. 597

JAMES et al. v. GERMANIA IRON CO.

BELDEN v. MIDWAY CO.

Nos. 1,434, 1433.

United States Court of Appeals, Eighth Circuit.

March 28, 1901

Syllabus by the Court.

The land department of the United States is a quasi judicial tribunal, invested with authority to hear and determine claims to the public lands subject to its disposition, and its decisions of the issues presented at such hearings, and its patents issued thereon, are impervious to collateral attack.

But a patent or decision of the land department is not impregnable to direct attack. The legal title derived from it may be charged with a trust for the benefit of the party lawfully entitled to it either on the ground (1) that, upon the facts found, conceded, or established without dispute at the final hearing before the department, its officers fell into a clear error in the construction of the law applicable to the case which caused them to issue the patent to the wrong party, or for the reason (2) that through fraud or gross mistake they fell into a misapprehension of the facts proved before them which had the like effect.

One who would attack a patent or decision of the department for a mistake of fact, however, must plead and prove the evidence before the department from which the mistake resulted, the particular mistake that was made, the bay in which it occurred, and the fact that, if it had not been made, the decision would have been otherwise, and the patent would not have issued to the patentee, before any court can enter upon the consideration of the original issue of fact determined by the department.

The equitable title to land acquired by a lawful entry cannot be devested or affected by subsequent decisions of the land department, or subsequent rules or modification of rules of practice therein.

The entry of public land under the laws of the United States whether legal or illegal, segregates it from the public domain, appropriates it to private use, and withdraws it from subsequent entry or acquisition until the prior entry is officially canceled and removed.

Rules of practice of the land department formally established and promulgated by authority of the secretary of the interior can be repealed or abrogated by like formal action and publication only. Decisions or opinions of the secretary and the commissioner in contests between claimants for specific tracts of land ignoring or violating rules neither repeal nor modify them.

The rule of practice of the land department that after the local land officers made their reports to the commissioner of a contest over an entry of land they should 'thereafter take no further action affecting the disposal of the land in contest until instructed by the commissioner' was in force in 1889, and it prohibited the acquisition of any legal or equitable right to the land through the local land officers during the time between the date of a decision or judgment of the secretary or commissioner canceling the prior entry and the receipt by the local land officers of official notice of that judgment as well as during the time between the making of the original reports of the contest and the date of the decision.

On February 18, 1889, the secretary of the interior decided that a prior entry of a certain tract of land was void, and that the land was open to disposal under the land laws. This decision was communicated to the local land officers on February 22, 1889. On February 19, 1889, A. made an application to the local officers to enter the land. B. was the first applicant to enter it after the local officers received official notice of the decision canceling the prior entry. The secretary decided that A. acquired the superior right to the land, and issued a patent in accordance with this conclusion. Held, this decision was a clear error of law, and B., the first applicant after the local officers were officially notified of the decision, was entitled to a decree charging the title under the patent with a trust for his benefit.

A party who institutes and conducts a litigation in another's name is as conclusively estopped by the decision and judgment therein from again litigating the same issues with his adversary as is the party in whose name he carries on the contest.

In an action between the same parties or those in privity with them upon the same claim or demand, a decision upon the merits is conclusive not only as to every matter offered, but as to every admissible matter which might have been offered, to sustain or defeat the claim or demand. But in a case in which the second litigation is upon a different claim or demand the prior judgment is an estoppel as to those matters in issue or points in controversy which were actually litigated and decided, and upon which the finding or judgment was based.

As against an innocent purchaser of Porterfield scrip, the government, and, a fortiori, a stranger, are estopped from claiming that the government is the owner, or that the land warrant is invalid, because a former owner twice tendered it to the United States in payment for a cash entry and patent of land, and the government twice refused to accept it.

These appeals challenge decrees to the effect that the appellants hold their title to the N.W. 1/4 of the S.E. 1/4 of section 30, in township 63 N., of range 11 W. of the fourth P.M., in the state of Minnesota, in trust for the appellees. The decree in the suit first named evidences the result of the trial of the issues tendered by the bill in equity which was sustained by this court in Iron Co. v. James, 32 C.C.A. 348, 89 F. 811. Subsequent to the commencement of that suit the Germania Iron Company conveyed its interest in the land to the Midway Company, a corporation, and another suit was brought by that company against James Belden, who had succeeded to the interest of some of the defendants in the earlier suit. The second suit rests upon the same basis as the first, and the only new issue of any importance that it tenders is the bona fides of Belden's purchase. The two suits were heard and decided together below, and they will hereafter be treated as one in this court.

This litigation is a contest between the Midway Company, the appellee, which claims an equitable title, and Houghton E James, James Belden, and Charles W. Hillard, the appellants who hold the legal title, to the land in dispute under a patent issued to William Craig on October 23, 1896. On February 18, 1889, this land was, and long had been, segregated from the public domain, and appropriated to private use by the previous location of Sioux half-breed scrip upon it. A contest had arisen over it between the locator of the scrip and one who applied to pre-empt the land, had been heard by the local land officers, and had, by proper appeals, been presented to the secretary of the interior for decision. On that day the secretary filed a decision directed to the commissioner of the general land office in which he held that the location of the scrip was invalid, that the attempted pre-emption was fraudulent and void, and that the judgment of the department was that the land in question was open to disposal under the public land laws of the United States applicable thereto. The local land officers at Duluth were first officially informed of this decision on February 22, 1889, which was a holiday, and on the morning of February 23, 1889, before opening their office for business, the entry of this land with the Sioux scrip was first canceled on the books and plats of the local land office. They opened their office promptly at 9 o'clock on the morning of that day. There was a large crowd of people besieging the office and waiting to secure this 40 acres of land, and when the door was open Emil Hartmann in person and Warren N. Draper in the name of Charles P. Wheeler each applied to enter it with Porterfield land warrants. The register and receiver found that Hartmann's application was first in time, and accepted and allowed his entry. The appellee has succeeded to the interest thus secured by Hartmann. After the decision of the secretary on February 18, 1889, and again on February 19, 1889, Houghton E. James applied to the local land officers at Duluth to make a homestead entry of this land, they rejected his application because the land was covered by the prior entry with Sioux scrip. In this state of the case a contest arose between Hartmann, Wheeler, and James for this land, and this contest was carried by appeals to the secretary of the interior, who, on December 21, 1894, decided that the attempted homestead entry by James before the decision of February 18, 1889, was officially communicated to the local land officers, and before the entry with the Sioux scrip had been canceled on their books and plats was valid and effectual, and entitled to priority over the entry of Hartmann. In pursuance of this decision Hartmann's entry was canceled, and James entered the land as a homestead on August 6, 1895. On September 23, 1895, pursuant to an agreement made between him and Warren N. Draper, an attorney at law, James relinquished his claim to this land to the United States, and William Craig entered it with Porterfield land warrant No. 75. Three days later Craig and his wife, at the suggestion of Draper, made a mining lease of the land for 50 years to Joseph H. Chandler, an attorney at law. On the same day Craig and his wife conveyed an undivided half of the land to Houghton E. James. James received $6,500 and this deed for his relinquishment. On October 10, 1895, Chandler assigned the mining lease to the appellee C. W. Hillard. On February 5, 1896, Craig and his wife conveyed their remaining half of the land to James Belden for $12,000, subject to the mining lease; and on March 16, 1898,...