Payne v. Hall
| Decision Date | 13 December 1921 |
| Docket Number | 34233 |
| Citation | 185 N.W. 912,192 Iowa 780 |
| Parties | M. M. PAYNE, Appellee, v. GEORGE W. HALL et al., Appellants |
| Court | Iowa Supreme Court |
Appeal from Frcmont District Court.--E. B. WOODRUFF, Judge.
ACTION to quiet title to certain lands. Decree as prayed and defendants Hall and Foster appeal. The facts appear in the opinion.
Affirmed.
R. F Hickman and Wilson & Keenan, for appellants.
Tinley Mitchell, Pryor, Ross & Mitchell, for appellee.
STEVENS, J., took no part in decision.
This action involves certain lands adjacent to the Missouri River in Fremont County, Iowa. An understanding of the matters in dispute can best be obtained by the examination of the accompanying plat.
[SEE MAP IN ORIGINAL]
It will be observed that there are three irregular lines running across the plat. The middle of these three lines represents the meander line of the Missouri River, which, it appears from the evidence, was also approximately the eastern bank of the river as it existed for some years after the original government survey, which was made in 1846. As indicated on the plat, the appellee, M. M. Payne, is the owner of numerous 40-acre tracts lying east of the Missouri River in Section 3. He was also the owner of certain lands immediately adjacent to the river. All the portion of Section 4 that was capable of being surveyed at the time of the original survey was platted as Lot 1 of Section 4. The appellee also owned Lots 1, 2, and 3 in Section 3, all abutting upon the original meander line of the river.
The undisputed evidence shows that, many years ago, the river began a gradual process of erosion to the eastward, and encroached upon these lands belonging to the appellee. This process continued until a time not definitely fixed in the evidence, but approximately the latter part of the 80's, when the river had reached its easternmost location. At that time, the river had entirely overflowed and eroded Lot 1 in Section 4 and Lots 1, 2, and 3 in Section 3, and had encroached somewhat upon the land farther to the east. The irregular line to the right in the plat indicates the approximate location which the river reached in this manner. At a later date, not definitely fixed in the record, but in the early 90's, the river began to recede from its new location, and to gradually fill in its former bed by alluvial deposits. It formed a new channel farther west than the original channel had been, and at the time of the trial, the eastern or Iowa bank of the channel of the river was as indicated by the irregular line to the left side of the plat.
It is the contention of the appellee that the lands marked on the plat as being accretions to Lot 1 of Section 4 and Lots 1, 2, and 3 of Section 3 belong to him, and he seeks to quiet title to said land. It is the contention of the appellants that the lands in question did not accrete to the lands of appellee, but that an island was formed in the river bed, and that the accretions were largely made to said island, and not to the mainland.
I. A few general observations may help us in arriving at a conclusion in the case. It is conceded on all hands that the Missouri River is a navigable stream. Meander lines are not boundary lines, but are only lines of survey, to determine the area included in irregular tracts bordering on navigable streams or lakes. Riparian owners along the banks of the Missouri River in Iowa hold title to the land to high-water mark, regardless of whether or not the same coincides with the meander line. McManus v. Carmichael, 3 Iowa 1; Houghton v. C. D. & M. R. Co., 47 Iowa 370; Holman v. Hodges, 112 Iowa 714, 84 N.W. 950.
The state of Iowa owns the title to the bed of the Missouri River from high-water mark to the center or thread of the stream. Iowa v. Illinois, 147 U.S. 1, 37 L.Ed. 55, 13 S.Ct. 239; Hardin v. Jordan, 140 U.S. 371, 35 L.Ed. 428, 11 S.Ct. 808; Holman v. Hodges, supra. If, by a slow and gradual process of erosion, the river washes away its banks and changes its course, the title of the state to the bed of the stream follows the course of the river in forming the new channel. If there is some avulsion of the stream, whereby it suddenly changes its channel in such a way as to cut off a body of land which still remains in such a condition that it can be identified, then the boundary lines of riparian property owners are not changed by such sudden avulsion or cut-off. Kitteridge v. Ritter, 172 Iowa 55, 151 N.W. 1097.
Where lands are overflowed and submerged, and within a reasonable time the waters retire and the land reappears, the title of the owner is not disturbed, and the proprietorship remains in the original owner. Mulry v. Norton, 100 N.Y. 424 (3 N.E. 581); St. Louis v. Rutz, 138 U.S. 226, 34 L.Ed. 941, 11 S.Ct. 337; Ocean City Assn. v. Shriver, 64 N.J.L. 550 (46 A. 690).
This rule has also been recognized where lands are removed by erosion, and are restored by accretion after the river recedes. Allard v. Curran, 41 S.D. 73 (168 N.W. 761).
Where the lands of a riparian owner are removed by the gradual process of erosion by the river, the land being no longer capable of identification, but having been carried away entirely, and the river occupies the identical space formerly occupied by the lands of the riparian owner, the title to the land so occupied by the bed of the river passes from the owner of the land to the state. This is one of the necessary incidents of riparian ownership. It is also the law that, where an island is formed in the channel of a navigable river, whether the same be over the original river bed or over a new bed formed by the erosion of the banks of the river, such island so formed in the channel of the river becomes the property of the state. The island is regarded as in the nature of an accretion to the bed of the river, and belongs to the state, the same as the river bed itself. Cooley v. Golden, 117 Mo. 33 (23 S.W. 100); Perkins v. Adams, 132 Mo. 131 (33 S.W. 778); People v. Warner, 116 Mich. 228, 74 N.W. 705; Holman v. Hodges, supra; Bigelow v. Hoover, 85 Iowa 161, 52 N.W. 124.
It also appears to be the law that, where the lands of a riparian owner have been slowly and gradually eroded by a navigable stream, and the river has usurped and taken up the location of said land, the riparian owner of the land at the newly formed river bank becomes entitled to the accretions that may thereafter be formed against said bank, even though they should extend over the same territory where lands of a former riparian owner had been located before the erosion took place. For example, if A is a riparian owner upon a navigable stream, and B owns land remote therefrom, and by erosion the river cuts away all of the lands belonging to A, and leaves B as the riparian owner on the newly formed bank of the stream, and thereafter the river slowly retires from this situation and places accretions against the newly formed bank, said accretions will belong to the riparian owner B, even though they extend over the very space formerly occupied by the riparian owner A. Yearsley v. Gipple, 104 Neb. 88 (175 N.W. 641); Welles v. Bailey, 55 Conn. 292 (10 A. 565); Widdecombe v. Chiles, 173 Mo. 195 (61 L. R. A. 309, 73 S.W. 444); Wood v. McAlpine, 85 Kan. 657 (118 P. 1060); Fowler v. Wood, 73 Kan. 511 (85 P. 763); Naylor v. Cox, 114 Mo. 232 (21 S.W. 589); Peuker v. Canter, 62 Kan. 363 (63 P. 617).
II. Applying these general rules to the facts of the instant case, we find that, by the slow process of erosion, the Missouri River changed its channel and worked eastward until it had entirely cut away the lands in Lot 1, Section 4, and Lots 1, 2, and 3 in Section 3, and other lands lying to the east. The location where these lands had been became thereby a part of the bed of the Missouri River, and title thereto became vested in the state, while so occupied by the river. Appellee was, however, still a riparian owner; for he owned the lands that bordered upon the eastern bank of the river at the time it reached its eastern-most location, as shown on the plat.
Appellants contend that appellee does not, by his pleadings, claim the lands in controversy as accretions to the lands which bordered on the river at the time it was farthest eastward, but only as accretions to the lands which bordered on the original bank, and which were entirely eroded by the eastward movement of the river. In this contention, we think appellants are in error. Appellee's petition and his proof are broad enough to entitle him to claim the lands in question as accretions to lands owned by him on the east bank of the river when it had reached its farthest point of invasion of the lands on the Iowa side. If the accretions formed by the river as it receded from the newly formed eastern bank were accretions to the mainland, then they belonged to the appellee, as riparian owner, in any event, and he was entitled to have his title quieted thereto.
III. It is appellants' contention that, after the river began to recede from its easternmost location, an island appeared in the stream, distinctly separated from the shore, and that this island was located upon that portion of the river bottom that occupied, in part, the location of a portion of appellee's lands before the river wrested them from appellee by erosion. Appellants contend that, when such an island appeared in the stream of the river, it then belonged to the state, although it was located upon the exact spot where the surface of appellee's lands had been before the erosion took place.
We are inclined to sustain appellants' view of the law in regard to such a situation. The maxim "cujus est solum ejus est usque ad coelum et ad inferos" does...
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Chapter 14 OWNERSHIP OF MINERAL INTERESTS UNDERLYING INLAND BODIES OF WATER AND THE EFFECTS OF ACCRETION AND EROSION
...of land appearing in a stream is of sufficient size, importance and permanence to be regarded as an island. Thus, in Payne v. Hall, 185 N.W. 912 (Iowa 1921), land ordinarily connected with the mainland but which during times of high water was separated therefrom was not considered to be an ......