Newman v. Ashe

• Decision Date: 30 September 1876
• Citation: 68 Tenn. 380
• Parties: W. P. NEWMAN et al. v. P. W. ASHE et al.
• Court: Tennessee Supreme Court

68 Tenn. 380

W. P. NEWMAN et al.

v.P. W. ASHE et al.

Supreme Court of Tennessee.

September Term, 1876.

FROM KNOX.

Appeal from the Circuit Court. E. T. HALL, Judge.

CALDWELL & WASHINGTON for plaintiffs.

CORNICK BAXTER for defendants.

MCFARLAND, J., delivered the opinion of the court.

This is an action of ejectment, brought to recover a lot of land two hundred feet square, lying within the present corporate limits of the city of Knoxville. The plaintiffs having failed in the action, bring the cause to this court for revision. It is conceded that the land was formerly owned by Calvin Morgan, and both parties claim title through him. On the 6th of December, 1838, said Morgan conveyed the lot in dispute to the mayor and Aldermen of Knoxville, for the purpose of erecting a reservoir thereon. This deed was duly registered. No reservoir was ever erected, however, and the city authorities afterwards sub-divided the lot and sold and conveyed to various parties--the several defendants to this action and others through whom they claim.

Calvin Morgan died between the years 1850 and 1852, and on the 12th of February, 1853, the executor of his will conveyed to John Fouche twenty-five acres of land, including the land in dispute. On the 22d of April, 1853, Fouche conveyed to Jacob Newman, Tazewell and W. G. Newman, a lot the boundaries of which also include the disputed land.

This deed, after giving the boundaries, uses this language: “Containing, (after deducting two hundred feet square, heretofore sold by Calvin Morgan, sr., to the corporation of Knoxville for a reservoir lot), six acres 99-100 poles.” In another part of the deed, the bargainer quit claims to the bargainees all his title to said two hundred feet square, but without warranting the title. The action is brought by W. G. Newman and the heirs of Jacob and Tazewell W. Newman.

It is manifest upon this statement, that if the deed of Calvin Morgan to the mayor and aldermen, of the 6th December, 1838, be valid, and nothing else appearing, the title of the defendants is superior.

The plaintiffs therefore maintain: 1st, that this deed was inoperative and void, because the land at the time was without the corporate limits of the city of Knoxville, and the corporate authorities had no power under the charter and laws to purchase and take the title to such land; and 2d, if this be not so, that the title of the city was lost by reason of its failure to perform the conditions contained in the deed, and the title thereby reverted to the grantor and passed to them under their deeds.

These questions were determined against the plaintiffs by the circuit judge.

Upon the first question, a strict construction of the powers of municipal corporations may be conceded as the safer rule, and that such corporations must act within the powers of their charters, and to carry out the legitimate purposes of their creation; and the power to purchase real estate for the purposes of speculation could certainly not be inferred from the general powers contained in city charters. But the act of the 19th January, 1838, while it does...