Torres v. Village of Capitan
| Decision Date | 09 August 1978 |
| Docket Number | No. 11567,11567 |
| Citation | 1978 NMSC 65,92 N.M. 64,582 P.2d 1277 |
| Parties | Frank TORRES, Ernest Trujillo and Willie Romero, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. The VILLAGE OF CAPITAN, a Municipal Corporation, Jay Johnston, Mayor, Dick Beck, Norman Renfro, Herman Otero and Valton Hall, members of the Village Trustees, Defendants-Appellees. |
| Court | New Mexico Supreme Court |
Plaintiffs-appellants, Frank Torres, Ernest Trujillo and Ernie Romero (hereinafter Torres) brought suit in the Lincoln County District Court against the Village of Capitan and the Village Trustees (hereinafter Village) seeking to invalidate an annexation of contiguous land by the Village. The court denied Torres' motion for summary judgment on the pleadings and entered judgment on a stipulated record in favor of the Village. Torres appeals. We affirm.
The issues are:
1. Whether the doctrine of either res judicata or collateral estoppel is an effective bar against the annexation by the Village under the circumstances where the Village had previously annexed "the same territory", where the annexation was challenged in court by Torres with the "same parties" participating, and where the district judge in the first trial ruled that § 14-7-17, N.M.S.A. 1953, the annexation statute relied upon in both cases, was unconstitutional.
2. Whether the statute, § 14-7-17, Supra, which authorizes a municipal corporation to annex contiguous territory upon the petition of the Owners of a majority of the acres In the territory in question, is unconstitutional as being in violation of the "one man-one vote" principle of the equal protection clause of the United States Constitution, in that it does not provide for annexation by a petition of a Majority of the landowners in the area to be annexed without regard to the number of acres each owns.
In order to decide the second issue, we must also decide whether signing a petition to initiate an annexation proceeding is equivalent to casting a ballot and thus entitled to the special protection accorded voting rights under the equal protection clause of the Constitution.
3. Whether § 14-7-17, Supra, was the proper statute since allegedly the Village was the prime-mover in the efforts to obtain signatures on the annexation petition. We handle this question summarily for the reason that, even if the Village promoted the annexation effort, which does not clearly appear from the record, the evidence plainly shows that the landowners were the real petitioners instead of the Village and proper proceedings were conducted under the terms of the statute.
The Village concluded the first annexation on December 1, 1975, after having received a petition which was allegedly signed by owners of a majority of the acreage in the area to be annexed. The number of residents in the area was established as between 29 and 31.
Of the thirteen signatures on the petition seven had been placed there by an attorney-in-fact, rather than by the property owners. The trial court held that these signatures were not proper for the reason that the powers-of-attorney had not been recorded. However, the trial court held that the question of the adequacy of the signatures was a moot issue, since it was ruling that § 14-7-17, Supra, was unconstitutional as being violative of the "one man-one vote" rule.
The record included a copy of the first petition for annexation which showed that the total acreage to be annexed was 256.25 acres and that the owners of 153.51 acres had signed the petition. The court's holding that the signatures of Hollis Cummins as attorney-in-fact for owners of 87.27 acres of land were invalid would necessarily mean that the petition was insufficient under the statute since the six owners that remained on the petition held less than a majority of the acreage in the area to be annexed.
The trial court concluded that § 14-7-17, Supra, is unconstitutional as being in violation of the "one man-one vote" rule of the equal protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution because it allocates "votes" based on the acres involved rather than the number of owners. The Village did not appeal the decision of the court.
A second annexation was approved by the Village on October 19, 1976. This was based on a new petition, purportedly signed not only by owners representing a majority of the acreage to be annexed but also by a majority of the owners of land in the territory involved.
The same petitioners, including Torres, challenged the legality of the second annexation in the district court with a different judge presiding.
The record is quite complicated. The Village in its answer admitted that "the identical territory" was involved in the second petition as in the first one, although the record does not sustain this fact. Nevertheless, the court made a finding to this effect. The second Petition for Annexation showed that the landowners who signed owned 174.94 acres of a total of 250.70 acres in the area proposed to be annexed. This contrasts with the evidence at the first trial which showed that thirteen owners holding 153.51 acres in a tract of 256.25 acres were involved in the first annexation.
A plat of the acreage to be annexed became part of the record in the second case. It showed that there had been changes in the ownership of several of the tracts of land since the first trial.
The trial court in the second case held that the parties in the two cases were identical, that the territory was identical and that the capacity of the persons in both suits was identical. On the other hand, the court concluded that the subject matter of the first cause was the 1975 annexation attempt, while the subject matter of the second cause was the 1976 annexation attempt. Therefore, since the subject matter was not identical, the doctrine of res judicata was not applicable. Collateral estoppel was also rejected by the court. The court further held that § 14-7-17, Supra, is not unconstitutional for the reasons claimed.
Many New Mexico cases have stated the requirements for applying the doctrine of res judicata to bar a subsequent case. The second suit must be identical with the prior suit in four respects: (1) identity of the subject matter, (2) identity of the cause of action, (3) identity of persons and parties, and (4) identity of the capacity or character of the persons for or against whom the claim is made. E. g. City of Santa Fe v. Velarde, 90 N.M. 444, 564 P.2d 1326 (1977); Atencio v. Vigil, 86 N.M. 181, 521 P.2d 646 (1974); Adams v. Cox, 55 N.M. 444, 234 P.2d 1043 (1951).
The key question is whether the court was correct in holding that the essential element of identity of subject matter in the two suits is lacking. The subject matter of the first suit was the 1975 annexation attempt which turned out to be based on an invalid annexation petition. It was not necessary in the first suit that the trial judge reach the question of constitutionality of the annexation statute. The subject matter of the second suit was the 1976 annexation which was based on an entirely different ordinance, on a petition that contained a majority of the owners of land in the area to be annexed and representing a majority of the acres involved, and proceedings that were free of any valid objection.
The ultimate facts necessary for the resolution of the two suits were different. The issues necessarily dispositive in the prior cause were therefore different from those in the present cause. City of Santa Fe, supra.
We hold that the doctrine of res judicata is inapplicable.
The doctrine of collateral estoppel, sometimes referred to as "issue preclusion", is an entirely distinct concept. City of Santa Fe, supra; Atencio, supra. It applies to identical issues in two suits where the same parties are involved in both suits even though the "subject matter" or the "cause of action" in the second is different from the first. Collateral estoppel applies to prevent the relitigation, as between the parties, of ultimate facts or issues actually and necessarily decided by the prior suit. Lawlor v. National Screen Service, 349 U.S. 322, 326, 75 S.Ct. 865, 99 L.Ed. 1122 (1955); City of Santa Fe, supra; Atencio, supra; Paulos v. Janetakos, 46 N.M. 390, 129 P.2d 636 (1942). In the situation before us the "subject matter" of the two suits is different since the "subject matter" of the suits is not simply the land involved, but the two different attempts to annex the same land. Likewise the "cause of action" in each suit is different because each seeks review of the validity of different annexation attempts.
Nevertheless collateral estoppel can be applied to bar relitigation of any ultimate facts or issues common to both suits, and actually and necessarily decided in the first. Torres contends that the doctrine of collateral estoppel should likewise apply to prevent the remaking of any conclusions of law made in the first case and asserts that the parties and the trial court in the second case are estopped to reconsider the conclusion of law made in the first case that the annexation statute is unconstitutional.
We do not agree with this contention. The whole concept underlying collateral estoppel is to aid the finality of judgments by preventing Parties from endlessly relitigating the same issues under the guise of different "causes of action." It is not intended to tie the hands of judges nor to be a way to amend the law of New Mexico by forcing one judge to accept the conclusions of pure law made by another without benefit of an appeal to this Court. Where a judge's ruling on a matter of law is intertwined with the facts of a particular case it is collaterally binding in a...
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