Rhinehart v. Leitch

• Decision Date: 28 February 1928
• Citation: 107 Conn. 400,140 A. 763
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court
• Parties: RHINEHART v. LEITCH.

140 A. 763

107 Conn. 400

RHINEHART v. LEITCH.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

February 28, 1928

Appeal from Superior Court, Fairfield County; John Richards Booth Judge.

Action by Lionial D. Rhinehart against Frank E. Leitch for an injunction to restrain defendant from violating certain restrictions contained in a deed. Judgment for defendant, and plaintiff appeals. No error.

Raymond E. Hackett, of Stamford, for appellant.

Norris E. Pierson, of Stamford, for appellee.

Argued before WHEELER, C.J., and MALTBIE, HAINES, HINMAN, and BANKS JJ.

MALTBIE, J.

Plaintiff and defendant own adjoining lands in a portion of the city of Stamford known as " Pinehurst," a real estate development which, in all, included about 170 lots. Both acquired title from the Pinehurst Realty Corporation. That corporation had acquired the whole tract from the Morewood Realty Company under a deed containing certain restrictions. Among these is one which provides:

" No part of the foundation of any building constructed on said lots shall be within twenty-five feet of the street line on which said lot fronts."

The deed to the defendant was expressly made subject to all the restrictions contained in the deed from the Morewood Company to the Pinehurst Company. It included two lots, one at the corner of Bedford and Third streets, and the other adjoining it on Bedford street. Each lot ran along Bedford street about 25 feet; the one on the corner ran along Third street 130 feet, and the other had a depth of about 127 feet. Plaintiff's deed included four contiguous lots, the tract adjoining defendant's lots, abutting on Third street and running along it about 100 feet in all, with a depth of about 125 feet. In March, 1927, the defendant began to construct on his lot a house which faced Third street, and the foundation walls of it were from 22 to 24 feet from the street line of that street. The plaintiff thereupon instituted this action, alleging a violation of the restriction which we have quoted, and seeking an injunction against the erection of the house. Thereupon the defendant changed his plans so that his house would face Bedford street. Under this plan the foundation wall parallel to that street would be about 25 feet back from the street line, but that on the Third street side would be only 16 feet from the street line, and a sun porch would extend within about 6 feet of it. With this situation before it, the trial court refused the injunction and the plaintiff has appealed.

The issue turns upon the question whether or not the foundation of the house as now planned will be within 25 feet " of the street line on which said lot fronts." The word " front" as applied to a city lot has little, if any, inherent application, but it takes on a borrowed significance from the building which is or may be constructed thereon. Connecticut Mutual Life Ins. Co. v Jacobson, 75 Minn. 429, 432, 78 N.W. 10; Adams v Howell, 58 Misc. 435, 108 N.Y.S. 945, 947. As applied to a building, " front" in general usage refers to that side of it in which is located the main entrance. Howland v. Andrus, 81 N.J. Eq. 175, 180, 86 A. 391; Oxford and Standard Dictionaries, " front." When used of a lot with a house upon it, it means that portion of the lot abutting upon the street toward which the house faces. So when used of a bare lot, by transposition of significance, it is that side toward which, in ordinary circumstances, a house, when built, will most likely face; in the case of a city lot of the dimensions of the defendant's plot, about 50 by 130 feet, though it be a corner lot, the very general usage of building houses with their main entrance toward the shorter street line results in a common understanding that that is the side intended when the " front" of the lot is referred to. Haviland v. Columbus, 50 Ohio.St. 471, 473, 34 N.E. 679. But the term is very far from one of art, and an examination of the cases which have construed reservations similar to the one before us make it very clear that the meaning is almost invariably determined by the context in which the word is used and the surrounding circumstances. These decisions therefore are of little value as precedents, and we must turn to the wording of the...