The State of Rhode Island, Complainant v. the State of Massachusetts, Defendant

• Decision Date: 01 January 1846
• Citation: 45 U.S. 591,4 How. 591,11 L.Ed. 1116
• Parties: THE STATE OF RHODE ISLAND, COMPLAINANT, v. THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS, DEFENDANT
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

45 U.S. 591 4 How. 591 11 L.Ed. 1116 THE STATE OF RHODE ISLAND, COMPLAINANT, v. THE STATE OF MASSACHUSETTS, DEFENDANT. January Term, 1846

THIS was a case of original jurisdiction in the Supreme Court, which now came up for final argument, having been partly discussed at a former term, and reported in 12 Peters.

A full statement of the case, with an analysis of the historical documents filed by the respective parties, would require a volume. The facts are summarily recited in the opinion of the court, which the reader is requested to peruse before reading the arguments of counsel.

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The case was argued by Mr. Randolph and Mr. Whipple, on the part of Rhode Island, and by Mr. Choate and Mr. Webster, on the part of Massachusetts.

The points of the arguments will be sufficiently understood by transcribing the briefs of the respective counsel. Mr. Randolph opened the case for the complainant. Mr. Choate and Mr. Webster followed, on the part of the defendant, and Mr. Whipple concluded the argument, on behalf of Rhode Island.

The brief on the part of the complainant was as follows:——

1st. That the words in the charter of Massachusetts of 1628, 'three miles north of the Merrimack River, and the most northerly part thereof, and three miles south of Charles River, and the most southerly part thereof,' according to their usual, ordinary, and long-established import, authorized lines three miles north and south of the Merrimack and Charles proper, and did not comprehend the tributary streams of either.

2d. That this was the construction given to the above words by the first settlers, and the colonial government of Massachusetts; that they not only thus limited their claim, but erected a bound-house three miles north of the Merrimack proper, near its mouth, in 1636, at a period when rival and opposing claims, as well as adversary settlements all along the line, forewarned her that she had reached the utmost limit of her chartered rights.

3d. That, notwithstanding these stimulating inducements, Massachusetts neglected to exercise any jurisdiction over a very large body of inhabitants, who had possessed the territory immediately north of her from 1621 until 1641, when, upon 'the reiterated and earnest solicitation of the inhabitants,' she received under her protection these inhabitants, who, according to her subsequent and very ambitious pretensions, had been all along her own people, upon her own soil, and famishing for want of sustenance and protection from their own government.

4th. That in 1638, 1639, and up to 1642, Massachusetts surveyed

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both her northern and southern lines. Taking the same principle as her guide on both her borders, she found the source of the tributary streams of the Charles on the south, and the Merrimack on the north, running her south line at or near the Woodward and Saffrey station, and her north from some part of Lake Winnepiseogee, thereby embracing all the State of New Hampshire, and nearly all the State of Maine, and she extended a jurisdiction, savoring strongly of conservatism, if not of severity, over both.

5th. That Massachusetts continued to exercise her jurisdiction over these extended limits from 1641 till 1676, except being ordered away from Maine by the king's commissioners, somewhere about 1660, which order she disobeyed, when John Mason, the proprietor of New Hampshire, presented his petition to the king. The merits of the claims were closely scrutinized by the king and council, aided by the chief justices of the King's Bench and Common Pleas. Massachusetts was unsuccessful in her new pretensions, and obliged to retire to the old bound-house, upon the Merrimack proper.

6th. That the decree of the king and council of 1677 was not a judicial decision merely, which other judicial bodies are at liberty to respect or not, according to its merits, but the decision of a grantor in relation to a grant, revocable in its very nature,—a grant of jurisdiction, and not of territory; that consequently the will of the king, thus expressed, was tantamount to a revocation of the old grant, and the issuing of a new one.

7th. That the agreement of 1710 and 1718 was entered into by the Rhode Island commissioners, upon the representation of the Massachusetts commissioners that the Woodward and Saffrey station was three miles from Charles River proper, and not three miles from any of its tributary streams, as is stated in the answer of Massachusetts. That no such pretension was then made, or ever made by Massachusetts after said decision of 1677. On the contrary, the whole entire agreement of 1710-1718 was entered into by Rhode Island, under the full belief that said station was three miles, and no more, from Charles River proper.

8th. That the only matter in dispute between said commissioners, from the first to the last, was not as to the station or starting-place, but in regard to the course of the line; that no compromise was ever proposed by either party as to the starting-point; that both parties agreed upon the Woodward and Saffrey station, because it was represented and believed to be three miles from Charles River proper, according to charter; and that this mistake was not discovered until 1750.

9th. That in 1750 Rhode Island appointed commissioners to meet those of Massachusetts, in order to complete the execution of the agreement of 1710-1718; that being unable to find the Woodward and Saffrey station (still believed to be three miles from

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Charles River proper), they were obliged to measure three miles from the river, and run an east and west line from its termination; that they erected monuments upon that line (four miles north of the pretended Woodward and Saffrey station), and the State of Rhode Island has claimed to that line, indicated by said bounds, still remaining, from that day to the present.

10th. That it was never pretended by Massachusetts that the Woodward and Saffrey station was the fruit of compromise, or that it was three miles from the tributaries of Charles River, until as late as 1790, when the commissioners of Massachusetts endeavoured to defend their claims upon that basis; that, on the contrary, Massachusetts, from 1710-1718 up to 1790, through her commissioners, uniformly claimed to the Woodward and Saffrey station, as being according to charter; and the agreement of Rhode Island of 1710-1718 as her title, and her only title, according to charter.

11th. That the assertion of the answer, that Massachusetts had claimed still further south (to the angle tree), and that Rhode Island claimed to Charles River proper, and that, upon these rival and opposing claims, a medium station was adopted, is contrary to the entire body of the evidence in the case, contrary to the fact, and mainly, if not entirely, the offspring of the active imaginings of learned and anxious counsel.

12th. That the answer is no evidence, coming from a corporation, in any case; much more as to matter not responsive to the bill.

13th. That Massachusetts never granted to the town of Providence the five thousand acres of land stipulated and covenanted to be granted by said agreement of 1710-1718; and that, in a court of equity, although covenants are independent, yet one will not be enforced without a full performance of the other. Best on Presumptions.

14th. Upon these facts the plaintiffs will contend that the agreement of 1710 was void,——

1. Because made under an evident and apparent mistake.

2. That it cannot operate to transfer four miles of the acknowledged territory of Rhode Island, because Rhode Island, as a colony, had no power to transfer her jurisdiction to Massachusetts.

3. That no confirmation can be presumed, because a confirmation of a void agreement is void itself.

4. Because a confirmation must have been of record in England, and also in Massachusetts, if not in Rhode Island; and that no case has gone the length of presuming the loss of a record, without some foundations being first laid to support such presumption.

5. Because Massachusetts has always claimed under the agreement of 1710-1718, and never alleged or pretended that there was any other title.

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6. Because the subject of the bounds of Massachusetts, involving the dispute in the present case, has been at various periods before the commissioners of the king, 1664; before the king and council, 1677, 1737; and at various other times between Connecticut and Rhode Island; and no such confirmation has ever been suggested, but the direct reverse.

Cases as to Mistake of Facts.

'A man is presumed to know the law. But no man can be presumed to be acquainted with all matters of fact, and therefore an ignorance of facts does not import culpable negligence.' Story's Equity Jurisprudence, 156.

'The general rule is, that an act alone, or contract made under a mistake or ignorance of a material fact, is voidable and relievable in equity.' Ibid., 155.

If instruments be delivered up by mistake, and owing to ignorance of a transaction which would have made it unconscientious to hold the instrument and proceed at law, equity will relieve. 1 Madd. Ch. Practice. The case cited is the East India Company v. Donald, 9 Ves. jr., from 275. A charter-party was delivered up to the defendant after a voyage, the provisions of which he had violated, the plaintiff being ignorant of the violation. It was agreed that there was no fraud nor misrepresentation, but the court said there was a plain mistake.

Tompkins v. Bernet, 1 Salk. 22. One of three persons paid money on a usurious bond, and afterwards recovered it back as paid by mistake, he not knowing the fact of the usury.

Bingham v. Bingham, 1 Ves. sen. 126, in 1748. 'An agreement was made for the sale of an estate to the plaintiff by defendant, who had brought an ejectment in support of a title thereto under a will.

'The bill was to have the purchase money refunded, as it appeared to have been the plaintiff's...