McMillin v. Titus
| Decision Date | 04 January 1909 |
| Docket Number | 103 |
| Citation | 222 Pa. 500,72 A. 240 |
| Parties | McMillin v. Titus, Appellant |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Argued October 12, 1908
Appeal, No. 103, Oct. T., 1908, by defendant, from judgment of C.P. Greene Co., May T., 1905, No. 86, on verdict for plaintiffs in case of Mary B. McMillin et al. v. L. C. Titus. Reversed.
Issue to determine title to minerals. Before HOLT, P.J., specially presiding.
The facts are stated in the opinion of the Supreme Court.
Verdict and judgment for plaintiffs. Defendant appealed.
Error assigned among others was in refusing binding instructions for plaintiffs.
The judgment of the court below is reversed, and judgment is now entered for the defendant.
J. W Ray, with him H. C. Staggers, for appellant.
A. F Silveus, with him James J. Purman and Willis F. McCook, for appellees.
Before MITCHELL, C.J., FELL, BROWN, MESTREZAT, POTTER, ELKIN and STEWART, JJ.
In construing a contract, the language should be interpreted so that the agreement as a whole may be carried into effect. If possible, no part of the contract is to be disregarded or treated as redundant. Repugnant clauses must be reconciled if it can be done. It cannot be assumed that the parties inserted repugnant or contradictory clauses or sentences in their contract, and, therefore, when there is an apparent contradiction in different parts of the instrument, it must be reconciled if possible so that the whole agreement will be given effect as expressing the intention of the parties. In ascertaining their intention, it is proper to take into consideration all the negotiations leading to the formation of the contract, its subjectmatter, the purpose to be effected, the consideration passing between the parties, and also all the circumstances surrounding the parties when they entered into the agreement. Where the terms of the promise admit of more senses than one, the promise is to be performed in that sense in which the promissor apprehended at the time the promisee received it: Williamson v. McClure, 37 Pa. 402, 408. Every agreement is to be interpreted and construed with reference to the circumstances under which the parties contract: COULTER, J., in Callen v. Kilty, 14 Pa. 286, 288. The words of a grant are to receive a reasonable construction, and one that will accord with the intention of the parties; and, in order to ascertain their intention, the court must look at the circumstances under which the grant was made: Connery v. Brooke, 73 Pa. 80, 83. A contract should be construed in the light of the surrounding circumstances and the objects manifestly to be accomplished: Richardson v. Clements, 89 Pa. 503, 505; McKeesport Machine Co. v. Insurance Co., 173 Pa. 53, 57.
Where the parties have interpreted the contract themselves and acted upon such interpretation, the court will regard it as the proper one and enforce it accordingly. "When a contract is capable of two different interpretations," says AGNEW, J., in Gass's Appeal, 73 Pa. 39, 48, "that which the parties themselves have always put upon it, and acted upon, especially as here for a long series of years, a court will follow, because it is the true intent and meaning of the parties which are to be sought for in the language they use." Courts will, if they can, give to the contracts of parties the exact effect which the parties themselves gave to them, and interpret them just as they interpreted them: Gillespie v. Iseman, 210 Pa. 1. When the court is asked to say what the parties meant or intended by their contract, it is entirely safe to point to their own construction of it, as evidenced by their course of dealing under it: People's Natural Gas Co. v. Braddock Wire Co., 155 Pa. 22, 25. Facts of public notoriety relating to the subject of a contract must be presumed to have been known to the parties at the time of making the contract, and the language used must be construed in reference to such facts: 9 Cyclopedia of Law & Procedure, 588.
An important and controlling question involved in this case requires the interpretation of a written contract. In the early part of 1864, Solomon Elliott, of Wharton township, Fayette county, procured a patent for a tract of land, containing about 108 acres, lying on both sides of Dunkard creek, and about one mile from the mouth of the creek, in Greene county. Within a year or two after he had obtained the patent, Elliott removed to the premises where he continued to reside until 1870. In that year he sold and conveyed the land to Levi Titus, "subject to such restrictions and leases as are now held upon said premises by the Seaton and Pioneer Oil and Mineral Company," and Titus at once entered into possession of it. For seven or eight yours Benjamin Titus, the son of the owner, resided on the land. L. C. Titus, another son of the owner, and the defendant in this action, then removed to the land and has since occupied it. Levi Titus died in 1886 and shortly thereafter about seventy-seven acres of the farm were awarded to L. C. Titus in partition.
Of these seventy-seven acres of land, about thirty-three acres are underlaid with the Pittsburg or River vein of coal. Titus sold this coal in 1902, and went to Waynesburg, the county seat of Greene county, to procure an abstract of title. Then he learned for the first time that there was on record an instrument in writing purporting to place the title to the coal in other parties. Upon examination, there was found the record of a paper, dated June 4, 1864, between Solomon Elliott of Wharton township of the first part and Charles S. Seaton and George W. K. Minor of the second part, all of Fayette county. The paper was signed by both parties. By this paper, Elliott for the consideration of $300, paid him in hand, and a further consideration of $500 to be paid him out of the oil obtained on the premises "granted, bargained, demised and leased . . . to Seaton and Minor, their heirs and assigns, the sole and separate and exclusive right and privilege of prospecting, examining and searching for coal, ore, or other minerals and for salt, oil, carbon oil, or other substances in and upon" his tract of land in Dunkard township; "and the right and privilege to dig, excavate, bore and sink pits and wells for any or all of the said coal, ore, salt, oil, carbon oil or other minerals and substances and to remove and take the same out of the earth on the premises aforesaid, hereby granting and releasing to the said party of the second part . . . all interest of the said party of the first part to the coal, ore, oil, carbon oil or other minerals and substances in or upon and under the same." The second parties were to have "the free use of erecting all necessary machinery and frames and vats to bore, dig and sink pits or wells and the free use of one acre of land at or immediately around each pit or well which said parties of the second part . . . may sink or dig upon said land and for erecting the buildings necessary to operate in digging and sinking said wells or pits and in working them after being sunk, in taking therefrom salt, oil, carbon oil, coal, ore or any other minerals or substances, and the free use of as much wood and coal as may be required to operate the machinery in sinking or pumping any or all wells that may be sunk by the said parties." It is further provided that "in case the said parties of the second part succeed in finding oil in sufficient quantities to justify operating any well sunk upon said land say ten barrels per day then the said parties of the second part agree to pay the said Solomon Elliott the additional sum of $500.00 as soon as enough oil is realized to amount in value to that sum and the same been put into market." An habendum and tenendum clause follows this stipulation.
In August, 1902, Titus presented his petition to the common pleas of Greene county averring, inter alia, the existence of the Elliott paper and asked that the court frame an issue under the Act of June 10, 1893, P.L. 415, between him and the plaintiffs in this action "to settle and determine their respective rights and title in and to" the coal and other minerals in and underlying the tract of land of which he claimed to be the owner. An issue was framed in which the successors in title to Seaton and Minor, claiming the two-thirds of the coal and other minerals, were made plaintiffs and Titus was made defendant. On the trial of the cause in the common pleas, the plaintiffs relied upon the paper of June 4, 1864, to establish their title. It was contended by the plaintiffs, and so held by the court, that the paper vested in Seaton and Minor the coal, oil and other minerals in fee, and therefore the plaintiffs, their grantees or assignees, took a fee simple title to all the minerals, including the coal in and under the defendant's tract of land. The court submitted to the jury to find whether the defendant had established a title to the minerals by adverse possession. A verdict was rendered for the plaintiff, and from the judgment entered thereon this appeal has been taken.
We are all of opinion that the learned court below was in error in construing the paper in question, to be a deed conveying in fee simple the minerals under the Titus land. The instrument must be interpreted in the light of the then existing conditions, of the acts of the parties, and the manifest purpose the parties had in view in executing it. It appears from the evidence that in the early sixties oil was discovered on Dunkard creek in Greene county, and that there followed in that territory the usual excitement accompanying such discoveries. Drilling operations began at several points on the creek. Prior to the execution of this paper, there had been at least two wells put down on the...
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