Roddy v. State
| Decision Date | 14 July 1943 |
| Docket Number | 7054 |
| Citation | 139 P.2d 1005,65 Idaho 137 |
| Parties | WM. RODDY and MINNIE E. RODDY, his wife, and A. C. BECKER and BEATRICE BECKER, his wife, respondents, v. STATE OF IDAHO; and CALVIN E. WRIGHT, State Auditor, in his official capacity as State Auditor of the State of Idaho; and MYRTLE P. ENKING, State Treasurer, in her official capacity as State Treasurer of the State of Idaho; and GEORGE W. WEDGWOOD, Commissioner of Finance, in his official capacity as Commissioner of Finance of the State of Idaho; and CALVIN E. WRIGHT, and MYRTLE P. ENKING, and GEORGE W. WEDGWOOD, individuals, Appellants |
| Court | Idaho Supreme Court |
1. Appeal and error
Suggesting errors in argument contained in brief to raise questions on appeal does not conform with rule of Supreme Court. Supreme Court Rules, rule 52.
2. Drains
Land lying in drainage district could not be pledged by drainage district for repayment of warrants issued as obligations of drainage district so that warrants would be liens against land unless authorized by provision of law.
3. Drains
Where drainage district did not execute lien or pledge to secure payment of warrants issued as obligations of district, land in district could not be pledged for repayment of warrants and, where there were no unpaid assessments against land which subjected land to lien, warrants were not a lien against land.
4. Quieting title
Where there was no evidence of any unpaid assessments of drainage district against plaintiff's land, and ownership thereof in plaintiff was shown and plaintiff had been paying taxes on her land since 1930, and state never claimed any interest therein other than the assertion of claim of lien thereon by reason of the warrants, judgment quieting title to the land in plaintiff as against the state was authorized.
5. Property
Where both plaintiffs and defendant claimed title and ownership to drainage district warrants, it was incumbent upon each party under the pleadings to prove title and ownership of claim.
6. Escheat
Where estate of deceased owner of drainage district warrants was administered on by the public administrator, because of lack of heirs of deceased, and it did not appear that warrants were a part of inventory and appraisement of estate, neither the state nor state auditor acquired any right or title to the warrants by the mere act of county officials in transferring warrants as collateral for security of county funds to the state auditor. (I.C.A., secs. 15-1613, 55-101 et seq. and 55-119.)
7. Escheat
Where drainage district warrants were never a part of the estate of deceased owner thereof because not inventoried or appraised therein, but were administered by the public administrator because there were no heirs of deceased owner, warrants did not pass to the state as escheated property until determination of heirship and a decree of distribution. (I.C.A., sec. 15-1613.)
8. Escheat
Evidence justified a finding that drainage district warrants were never a part of the estate of deceased owner thereof who left no heirs, so as to pass to the state as escheated property. (I.C.A., sec. 15-1613.)
9. Appeal and error
Finding supported by sufficient evidence will not be disturbed.
10. Trial
In action against the state to quiet title to drainage district warrants which warrants had been pledged as collateral for a note, exclusion of evidence as to a conversation between plaintiff and liquidating agent of bank regarding collateral for the note was not error, where no offer of proof was made by defendants and there was no indication as to what the witness' testimony would have been.
11. Trial
Where no statement is made of what a witness would testify to in answer to a question, the refusal of the court to permit the question to be answered is not available error.
12. Evidence
In action to quiet title to drainage district warrants claimed by state as escheated property, report of liquidator of a bank, purporting to show that the public administrator had paid a specified amount for certain drainage district warrants which witness testified was made from other records was properly excluded as not the "best evidence."
13. Evidence
The best evidence of which the case in its nature is susceptible and which is within the power of the parties to produce, must be adduced in proof.
14. Evidence
Secondary evidence is never admissible unless it is made manifest that the primary evidence is unavailable.
15. Trial
A motion for nonsuit admitted the existence of every fact disclosed or inferable from plaintiff's evidence.
16. Trial
In passing on motion for nonsuit, trial court was required to assume that all evidence introduced on behalf of plaintiff was true.
17. Escheat
In action to quiet title to drainage district warrants claimed by state as escheated property, motion for nonsuit was properly denied.
18. Appeal and error
Parties are generally restricted in the appellate court to the theory on which the cause was prosecuted or defended in the lower court.
19. Appeal and error
In action against the state to quiet title to drainage district warrants claimed as escheated property, where it was determined that warrants were not liens against land, ruling eliminating question as to whether warrants were paid by district, if error, was not prejudicial.
20. States
An action to quiet title to land sold to the state for delinquent drainage taxes and to drainage district warrants which were delivered to the state as escheated property would lie against the state officers, as against claim that the state was a "necessary party", that consent to the action had not been given, and that to permit the action to proceed would be to allow an action against the state by indirection and would deprive the state and its officials of sovereign rights of immunity.
Appeal from the District Court of the Eighth Judicial District of the State of Idaho, in and for the County of Benewah. Hon Albert H. Featherstone, District Judge.
Appeal from judgment quieting title to real property in respondents, and refusal to confirm title to personal property in appellants.
From a decree quieting title to real property in respondents, as against appellants, and ordering that appellants have no right, title, claim or interest in and to certain drainage district warrants, and that the possession of said warrants by appellants constitutes no cloud upon the title of said real property, and that appellants have no legal claim to said warrants, appellants appeal.
Judgment for respondents. Affirmed.
Bert H. Miller, Attorney General; Leo N. Bresnahan, J. R. Smead, Ariel L. Crowley, and R. W. Beckwith, Assistant Attorneys General, for appellants.
Respondents must recover on strength of their own title, not on weakness of appellants. (Washington State Sugar Co. v. Goodrich, 27 Idaho 26, 147 P. 1073; Wing v. Wallace, 42 Idaho 430, 246 P. 8.).
One who seeks equity must do equity and in an action to quiet title against liens even though outlawed, the court will not quiet title unless liens are paid. (Miller v. Monroe, 50 Idaho 726, 300 P. 362; Lemhi County v. Boise Livestock Loan, 47 Idaho 712, 278 P. 214; Nundini v. Milner, 47 Idaho 439, 276 P. 313; Cornelison v. U. S. Bldg. & Loan, 50 Idaho 1, 292 P. 243, 78 A.L.R. 1074.).
Wm. D. Keeton for respondents.
Money and land are the only articles of property that can escheat to the state, and then only after the law and statutes have been followed, and only after heirship has been determined. (See: Sec. 15-1613, Idaho Codes; sec. 15-1615; sec. 32-801; sec. 15-1701; sec. 14-201-14-207.).
Officers of a state may be made defendants in a civil action, and a suit in which officers are parties is not necessarily a suit against the state. (Tyler, 149 U.S. 164; Syl. 10, Scott v. McDonald; 165 U.S. 58; Louisville & N. R. Company v. Bosworth, 209 F. 380; Hall v. Bledsoe, 189 S.W. 1041; Fidelity & Deposit Company of Maryland v. Shaid, 137 S.E. 878, 103 W. vs. 432.).
Respondents bring this action against appellants to quiet their title to certain real property particularly described in the complaint, and located in Benewah County, Idaho, and which property is within and a part of Drainage District No. 6 of said county, and to quiet their title as against appellants to certain warrants issued by said drainage district from July 10, 1931, to and including March 31, 1932, as follows, to-wit: No. 42 to G. A. Titus in the sum of $ 34.00; No. 99 to A. C. Becker, in the sum of $ 500.00; No. 100 to A. C. Becker, in the sum of $ 500.00; No. 104 to Elmer Smith in the sum of $ 100.90, and No. 106 to Benewah Sec. Co., for $ 52.50.
A joint demurrer to the complaint was interposed by all the defendants, and after hearing thereon, the court made an order that the state could not be sued without its consent, and for that reason sustained the demurrer as to the state, and in said order found that the demurrer of the state officials in their official capacities and as individuals was not well taken, and overruled the demurrer of said persons, who are appellants here. The ruling of the court on this demurrer is not assigned as error.
Thereafter appellants in their official capacities as such, and in their individual capacities, filed an answer, alleging that they, in their official capacities, and the State of Idaho, claim said warrants as escheated property by reason of the failure of the heirs of one Thomas Lyons, deceased; that said warrants constitute a cloud on the title of said real property; they alleged possession of said warrants and that they are a lien on the respondents' said land; as a...
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