Union Hall Ass'n v. Morrison

• Decision Date: 22 January 1874
• Citation: 39 Md. 281
• Parties: THE UNION HALL ASSOCIATION v. JAMES MORRISON.
• Court: Maryland Court of Appeals

39 Md. 281

THE UNION HALL ASSOCIATION v. JAMES MORRISON.

Court of Appeals of Maryland

January 22, 1874

APPEAL from the Circuit Court for Allegany County.

The bill of complaint in this case, the object and purpose of which are stated in the opinion of the Court, was filed by the appellant against the appellee. The Circuit Court (MOTTER, J.,) passed a decree dismissing the bill, and the complainant appealed.

The cause was argued before BARTOL, C.J., STEWART, BOWIE, MILLER and ALVEY, J.

R T. Semmes, for the appellant.

Is a bona fide purchaser without notice of any defect in his title, entitled to compensation for improvements from the true owner, upon a bill filed for that purpose?

If suit were brought against the complainant for rents, issues and profits, there could be no doubt about the right of the complainant to recoup the value of improvements even at law. 2 Story's Equity Juris., sec. 799, note a and b, secs. 1237, 1238, 1239; 2 Kent, 334, 335, n. a; Jones vs Jones, 4 Gill, 102; Greene vs. Biddle, 1 Bland, 71; 8 Wheat, 369; McLaughlin vs. Barnum, 31 Md., 425; Tongue vs Nutwell, 17 Md., 212.

Here we have a right both at law and equity, but which is subject to a strange anomaly, that it is useless unless the true owner sues for mesne profits after ejectment--a thing hardly probable when he finds the improvements to counterbalance any claim for rents and profits. Evidently a nugatory principle at the very time it ought to be valuable.

One of several tenants in common, who expends money in improving an estate, is entitled to compensation on partition. 2 Story's Eq. Juris., sec. 799, a, and note 3.

If a party, conceiving himself to be the owner, makes lasting improvements, a Court of Equity will not take the estate from him without compelling the plaintiff to make some allowance if he knew nothing of the defect in his title at the time of his purchase, even though apprised of the claim of the plaintiff below. Jones vs. Jones, 4 Gill, 87; Smith vs. Townshend, 27 Md., 368.

From these authorities it will be seen that the right of the bona fide possessor to compensation for improvements, after ejectment by the legal owner, is recognized. The only question, therefore, is whether the Courts which recognize this right are going to say that there is no independent remedy.

It is said there is no precedent, and the simple statement of that fact, enunciated in Kent's Commentaries and the text of Story's Jurisprudence, unsupported by any authority but Chancellor WALWORTH, in 6 Paige, itself based on the want of precedent, not on the strength of argument, is relied on to prevent an act of the simplest justice. The text in 2 Story's Eq. Juris., sec. 799, b., states: "They have never, in a direct suit by the bona fide possessor, enforced his claim to meliorations of the property from which he has been evicted by the true owner." The authority for this statement appears in the note to be Putnam vs Ritchie, 6 Paige, 390, 403 to 405 inclusive, in which Chancellor WALWORTH refused to grant the relief because there was no precedent; not because it was not justice, common sense and common honesty. Mr Justice STORY afterwards declined to follow said decision or refusal, and granted the relief prayed, as he says, because "it has the most persuasive equity, and I may add, common sense and common justice for its foundation." Bright vs. Boyd, 1 Story's Rep., 478, and 2 Story's Rep., 605. The facts of Bright vs. Boyd are identical with the case at bar. In this case it is plain that the only loser can be the complainant, that Morrison has never spent a cent on the property, and that on the supposition that both are innocent, by giving him the value of his land, equal justice and equity could be done without injury to anybody.

The learned Judge below, in giving his opinion, seems to think that the weight of authority is against the relief sought in this case. This it is submitted is error, for the proposition, as enunciated in Kent and Story, is not that the power does not exist to grant such relief, but simply that the Courts have not exercised it. And to support this proposition we have standing alone the case of Putnam vs. Ritchie, 6 Paige, 390 to 405.

And to support the proposition of the appellant that Courts of Equity will grant relief on a bill filed for the purpose, to the bona fide possessor without notice of defect in his title, we have Bright vs. Boyd, 1 Story, 478, and 2 Story, 505; Thomas vs. Thomas, 16 B. Monroe, 421; McKelway vs. Amon, 2 Stock Chy., 115; Blackwell on Tax Titles, 589, and notes; together with all the cases in this country and in our own State, which give relief when the worthy claimant of improvements can take advantage of them to resist a claim for rents, issues and profits by recoupment.

It only remains to be seen whether the facts of this case fix upon Morrison such a knowledge of his title and its effects as to make it a fraud in him to seek to deprive the appellant of the improvements, which cost it $3,000 and him nothing. 1 Story's Eq. Juris., sec. 388, and notes 3 and 4, sec. 389, sec. 385; Wendell vs. Van Rensselaer, 1 Johns. Ch. R., 354; Bright vs. Boyd, 1 Story, 478; Price and Bevans vs. McDonald, et al., 1 Md., 419; Hoffman vs. Smith, 1 Md., 491; Tongue's Lessee vs. Nutwell, 17 Md., 212; Smith vs. Townshend, et al., 27 Md., 388.

The history of his title, as set out in 33 Md., 96, is that the patent for ""The Trap" had been in the possession of Morrison's family for years, and had been handed down from generation to generation by devise; he, and those under whom he claimed, had been in possession of it, and had slept upon their rights so long as to leave the whole community in ignorance of the extent of his claim. Can it be possible that such laches as this shall not operate against him? Is it possible that a Court of Equity will deem the public bound by such notice, and yet relieve Morrison of the effect of the effect of such knowledge? If the appellant is bound to know the extent of his lines, he is also bound by them, and it was as much his duty to notify the appellant not to build, under penalty of loss of its improvements, as it was for the appellant to know that it was building on his lands. Price & Bevans vs. McDonald, et al., 1 Md., 419.

To deny this is to allow the holder of title to maintain ignorance of the lines of his land, by neglecting to have it surveyed, and after innocent parties have improved and built upon it, to take advantage of his own wrong by grabbing up the improvements without any compensation whatever. Can there be a more palpable opening for fraud?

J. H. Gordon, for the appellee.

The question presented by this case is, whether a party claiming to be the owner of land in Maryland, where the titles are all of record, is bound by the principle of caveat emptor, and required to know the sufficiency of his own title and extent of his lines; or, whether a squatter upon the adjoining land of his neighbor, who makes improvements and takes the chance of holding for twenty years, and thereby establishes a title by adversary possession, can, if he is interrupted before the twenty years are complete and his possession is broken by a recovery in ejectment, turn round and recover in equity the value of his improvements made while so in possession?

To permit such a recovery would encourage the grossest frauds and relieve trespassers from one of the punishments which the law justly inflicts upon them in the loss of their improvements.

Courts of Equity do not interfere by giving relief in cases of improvements made by one person on the lands of another, unless they are made under some agreement which would entitle the party to relief, or where a bill is filed by the legal owner for an amount of rents and profits, in which case the party making the improvements has a right to a deduction by way of recoupment. Or where a party having the title does some act to encourage the purchaser to make the improvements, which would amount to a fraud; in which case he would be estopped to claim the property until he pays for the improvements. Earl of Oxford's Case, 3 Lead. Cases in Equity, 166; Master of Clare Hall vs. Harding, 4 Harr., 273.

Justice STORY, in his Equity Jurisprudence, vol. 2, sec. 799, says: "In the present state of the authorities, involving as they do, some conflict of opinion, it is not possible to affirm more than that the jurisdiction for compensation or damages does not ordinarily attach in equity, except as ancillary to a specific performance, or some other relief. If it does attach in any other cases, it must be under very special circumstances, and upon peculiar equities, as, for instance, in cases of fraud, or in cases where the party has disabled himself by matters ex post facto from a specific performance, or in cases where there is no adequate remedy at law."

The rule given then by STORY is, " that jurisdiction does not ordinarily attach in equity. " The complainant must therefore bring itself within one of the exceptions to entitle it to relief. There is no specific performance claimed in this case, nor other relief of any kind to which the complainant's claim is ancillary. There are no special circumstances, such as fraud, to give jurisdiction, and no matters ex post facto, so that there is no possible exception to the ground ruled in this case to authorize the relief prayed.

The only special ground of relief which would exist in this case would be the fraudulently standing by of Morrison, and wilfully and knowingly permitting the expenditures to be made by the complainant on his ground without notice. That, too, is the ground upon which the case was intended to be put, but the evidence fails to make such a case. The agreement shows that...