Silver King Coalition Mines Co v. Conkling Mining Co

Decision Date28 February 1921
Docket Number187,Nos. 158,s. 158
Citation41 S.Ct. 310,65 L.Ed. 561,255 U.S. 151
PartiesSILVER KING COALITION MINES CO. v. CONKLING MINING CO. (two cases)
CourtU.S. Supreme Court

Messrs. Thomas Marioneaux, of Salt Lake City, Utah, Curtis H. Lindley, of San Francisco, Cal., W. H. Dickson and A. C. Ellis, Jr., both of Salt Lake City, Utah, and W. C. Prentiss, of Washington, D. C., for petitioner and appellant.

[Argument of Counsel from page 152-153 intentionally omitted] Messrs. F. B. Critchlow and Wm. W. Ray, both of Salt Lake City, Utah, for respondent and appellee.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 153-159 intentionally omitted] Mr. Justice HOLMES delivered the opinion of the Court.

This is a bill in equity brought by the respondent, the Conkling Mining Company, in order to establish its right to a large body of ore found under the southwesterly 135.5 feet of its patent as laid out by courses and distances, and to obtain an account from the petitioner, which has mined the ore, making a claim of right on its side. The District Court dismissed the bill. The decree was reversed by the Circuit Court of Appeals. Conkling Mining Co. v. Silver King Coalition Mines Co., 230 Fed. 553, 144 C. C. A. 607. Thereupon a writ of certiorari was granted by this Court. 250 U. S. 655, 40 Sup. Ct. 13, 63 L. Ed. 1192. A short statement will be enough to present the single issue that it is necessary to pass upon here. The only ground upon which the Conkling Mining Company stands is that the ore is within the lines of its patent extended vertically downward. If the patent properly construed does not cover the land in question the case is at an end.

The patent under which the Conkling Mining Company gets its title was granted to the Boss Mining Company and so far as material is as follows: It recites that in pursuance of the Revised Statutes, etc., there have been deposited in the General Land Office of the United States the plat and field notes of survey and the Certificate No. 1697 of the Register of the local land office with other evidence whereby it appears that the grantee duly entered and paid for that certain mining claim known as the Conkling lode mining claim, designated by the Surveyor General as Lot No. 689, 'bounded, described, and platted as follows * * * Beginning at corner No. 1 a pine post four inches square marked U. S. 689 P. 1. Thence' by courses and distances northwesterly 'to corner No. 2, a pine post four inches square marked U. S. 689 P. 2,' these two corners being undisputed. 'Thence second course, south sixty degrees and forty-five minutes west one thousand five hundred feet to corner No. 3. Thence third course, south twenty-one degrees and nine minutes east six hundred feet to corner No. 4.' It then grants 'the said mining premises hereinbefore described' and all that portion of veins, lodes or ledges, 'the tops or apexes of which lie inside of the surface boundary lines of said granted premises in said Lot No. 689,' etc., with a proviso confining 'the right of possession to such outside parts of said veins,' etc., 'to such portions thereof as lie between vertical planes drawn downward through the end lines of said Lot No. 689,' etc.

If 'corner No. 3' and 'corner No. 4' are determined by courses and distances alone the Conkling Mining Company is entitled to prevail upon the question that we are discussing. The Circuit Court of Appeals was of opinion that the patent represented an adjudication by the Land Department that the lot was 1500 feet long and 600 feet wide without regard to the location of the other posts which the field notes showed to exist but the patent did not mention. The District Court on the other hand held that evidence was admissible to show that there were monuments at corners No. 3 and No. 4, held that the monuments so established prevailed, and therefore decided that the title of the Conkling Mining Company failed.

The decree of the District Court appears to us to be supported by the face of the patent and by consideration of the circumstances. If a draughtsman were determining his description by courses and distances only it seems unlikely that he would insert 'corner No. 3' and 'corner No. 4' where the direction changed, as it would add nothing to the change of direction in the boundary line. The words by themselves suggest a reference to an external object, an interpretation greatly strengthened by the fact that the same phrase in the first two instances of its use referred to one in terms; and coupled with evidence that such an external object was found, the words at least tend to prove that a monument was meant. Of course evidence is admissible, if needed, to show that language is to receive the interpretation that taken by itself it invites. Furthermore the grant is of 'the said mining premises hereinbefore described,' assumed in the same sentence to be the lot designated by the Surveyor General as Lot No. 689; and, when it is observed that it is the duty of the Surveyor General to see that the lot is identified by monuments on the ground the presumption becomes almost irresistible that 'corner No. 3' and 'corner No. 4' mean corners determined as they are required to be determined by the law.

One statutory foundation of a mining claim is that 'the location must be distinctly marked on the ground so that its boundaries can be readily traced.' Rev. Sts. § 2324 (Comp. St. § 4620). To obtain a patent the claimant must file in the proper land...

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11 cases
  • Marathon Oil Co. v. Lujan, Civ. A. No. 89-F-1829.
    • United States
    • United States District Courts. 10th Circuit. United States District Court of Colorado
    • June 20, 1990
    ...patent immediately arises." Benson Mining Co. 145 U.S. at 431-32, 12 S.Ct. at 878-79; see also Silver King Co. v. Conkling Mining Co., 255 U.S. 151, 162, 41 S.Ct. 310, 312, 65 L.Ed. 561 (1921); El Paso Brick Co. v. McKnight, 233 U.S. 250, 259, 34 S.Ct. 498, 501, 58 L.Ed. 943 (1914); Black v......
  • Our Lady of the Rockies, Inc. v. Peterson
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court of Montana
    • April 1, 2008
    ...of the claim, which must be distinctly marked by monuments on the ground. See Silver King Coalition Mines Co. v. Conkling Mining Co., 255 U.S. 151, 161, 41 S.Ct. 310, 311, 65 L.Ed. 561 (1921); see also Waskey v. Hammer, 223 U.S. 85, 92, 32 S.Ct. 187, 188, 56 L.Ed. 359 (1912). Upon issuance ......
  • United States v. Big Bend Transit Co., 53.
    • United States
    • United States District Courts. 9th Circuit. Eastern District of Washington
    • December 31, 1941
    ...Security Land & Exploration Company v. Burns, 193 U.S. 167, 24 S.Ct. 425, 48 L.Ed. 662; Silver King Coalition Mines Company v. Conkling Mining Company, 255 U.S. 151, 41 S.Ct. 310, 65 L.Ed. 561; United States v. Redondo Development Co., 8 Cir., 254 F. 656; Watkins v. King, 4 Cir., 118 F. 524......
  • Sala v. Crane
    • United States
    • United States State Supreme Court of Idaho
    • December 7, 1923
    ...... Johnstone, 158 Cal. 119, 110 P. 294; Silver King. Coalition Mines Co. v. Conkling M. Co., ...Rogers, 14 Idaho 309, 94 P. 427; Olympia Mining. Co. v. Kerns, 15 Idaho 371, 97 P. 1031; Gerber ......
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1 books & journal articles
  • Chapter 12 THE EXTRALATERAL RIGHT: A LAST HURRAH?
    • United States
    • FNREL - Annual Institute Vol. 35 Rocky Mountain Mineral Law Institute (FNREL)
    • Invalid date
    ...in the United States Supreme Court; since 1921, however, when the Court decided Silver King Coalition Mines Co. v. Conkling Mining Co., 255 U.S. 151, and on reh'g, 256 U.S. 18 (1921), rev'g 230 Fed. 553 (8th Cir. [D. Utah] 1916), no extralateral rights case has reached that Court. [4] Not t......

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