United States v. Budd

• Decision Date: 28 March 1892
• Citation: 36 L.Ed. 384,12 S.Ct. 575,144 U.S. 154
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. BUDD et al
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

144 U.S. 154

12 S.Ct. 575

36 L.Ed. 384

UNITED STATES v. BUDD et al.

March 28, 1892.

Suit by the United States against David E. Budd and James B. Montgomery, to annul a timber-land patent. Decree dismissing the bill. 43 Fed. Rep. 630. The United States appeals. Affirmed.

STATEMENT BY MR. JUSTICE BREWER.

On July 23, 1882, the defendant David E. Budd applied at the United States land-office at Vancouver, Wash. T., for the purchase, as timber land, of the S. E. 1/4 of section 12, township 9, range 1 W., Willamette meridian. On November 10, 1882, he paid the purchase price, $2.50 per acre, and received the receiver's certificate, and on the 5th day of May, 1883, a patent was duly issued to him. On December 4, 1882, he conveyed the land to the other defendant, James B. Montgomery. His entry and purchase were made under the 'timber and stone' act of June 3, 1878, (20 St. p. 89.) Section 1 of this act provides:

'That surveyed public lands, * * * valuable chiefly for timber, but unfit for cultivation, and which have not been offered at public sale according to law, may be sold, * * * in quantities not exceeding one hundred and sixty acres to any one, * * * at the minimum price of two dollars and fifty cents per acre; and lands valuable chiefly for stone may be sold on the same terms as timber lands.'

Section 2, so far as it is applicable to the case at bar, is as follows:

'Sec. 2. That any person desiring to avail himself of the provisions of this act shall file with the register of the proper district a written statement, in duplicate, one of which is to be transmitted to the general land-office, designating by legal subdivisions the particular tract of land he desires to purchase, setting forth that the same is unfit for cultivation, and valuable chiefly for its timber or stone; * * * that deponent has made no other application under this act; that he does not apply to purchase the same on speculation, but in good faith to appropriate it to his own exclusive use and benefit; and that he has not, directly or indirectly, made any agreement or contract, in any way or manner, with any person or persons whatsoever, by which the title which he might acquire from the government of the United States should inure, in whole or in part, to the benefit of any person except himself; which statement must be verified by the oath of the applicant before the register or the receiver of the land-office within the district where the land is situated; and if any person taking such oath shall swear falsely in the premises, he shall be subject to all the pains and penalties of perjury, and shall forfeit the money which he may have paid for said lands, and all right and title to the same; and any grant or conveyance which he way have made, except in the hands of bona fide purchasers, shall be null and void.'

The third section of said act, so far as here applicable, is as follows:

'Sec. 3. That upon the filing of said statement * * * the rigister of the land-office shall post a notice of such application, embracing a description of the land by legal subdivisions, in his office, for a period of sixty days, and shall furnish the applicant a copy of the same for publication, at the expense of such applicant, in a newspaper published nearest the location of the premises for a like period of time; and after the expiration of said sixty days, if no adverse claim shall have been filed, the person desiring to purchase shall furnish to the register of the land-office satisfactory evidence—First, that said notice of the application prepared by the register, as aforesaid, was duly published in a newspaper as herein required; secondly, that the land is of the character contemplated in this act; * * * and, upon payment to the proper officer of the purchase money of said land, together with the fees of the register and the receiver, as provided for in case of mining claims in the twelfth section of the act approved May tenth, eighteen hundred and seventy-two, the applicant may be permitted to enter said tract, and, on the transmission to the general land-office of the papers and testimony in the case, a patent shall issue thereon.'

On March 15, 1886, the government filed this bill in the district court of the second judicial district of Washington Territory, making Budd, the patentee, and Montgomery, his grantee, parties defendant, the purpose of which was to set aside the patent and the title by it conveyed, on the ground that the land was not timber land within the meaning of the act, and that the title to it was obtained wrongfully and fraudulently, and in defiance of the restrictions of the statute. The defendants appeared and answered under oath, denying the charges, proofs were taken, and, on final hearing, a decree was entered in their favor dismissing the bill, (43 Fed. Rep. 630,) from which decree the United States appealed to this court.

Asst. Atty. Gen. Parker, for the United States.

[Argument of Counsel from pages 157-160 intentionally omitted] Jefferson Chandler, for appellees.

Mr. Justice BREWER, after stating the facts in the foregoing language, delivered the opinion of the court.

In the brief of counsel for the government it is stated that 'the two principal questions arising in the case are: First. Is there such a combination or conspiracy shown to have existed to obtain this, or this and other, timber lands for the defendant Montgomery, as authorizes the annulment of the patent issued to defendant Budd? Second. Is land of the character and description of this quarter section subject to entry and purchase under the 'timber and stone act' of 1878?'

The first question is, perhaps, stated too broadly, for the inquiry is necessarily limited to the land in controversy. If its title was fairly acquired, it matters not what wrongs have been done by either defendant in acquiring other lands; so the question properly to be considered is, was this land wrongfully and fraudulently obtained from the government? We have had many cases of this nature before us, and the rules to guide in its determination have been fully settled. Railroad Co. v. Attorney General, 118 U. S. 682, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 66; Maxwell Land-Grant Case, 121 U. S. 325, 381, 7 Sup. Ct. Rep. 1015; Coal, etc., Co. v. U. S., 123 U. S. 307, 8 Sup. Ct. Rep. 131; U. S. v. Des Moines Nav. & R. Co., 142 U. S. 510, 12 Sup. Ct. Rep. 308.

In the second of these cases Mr. Justice MILLER thus clearly states the rule:

'We take the general doctrine to be that when in a court of equity it is proposed to set aside, to annul, or to correct a written instrument, for fraud or mistake in the execution of the instrument itself, the testimony on which this is done must be clear, unequivocal, and convincting, and that it cannot be done upon a bare preponderance of evidence which leaves the issue in doubt. If the proposition, as thus laid down in the cases cited, is sound in regard to the ordinary contracts of private individuals, how much more should it be observed where the attempt is to annul the grants, the patents, and other solemn evidences of title emanating from the government of the United States under its official seal. In this class of cases, the respect due to patent, the presumptions that all the preceding steps required by the law had been observed before its issue, the immense importance and necessity of the stability of titles dependent upon these official instruments, demand that the effort to set them aside, to annual them, or to correct mistakes in them, should only be successful when the allegations on which this is attempted are clearly stated, and fully sustained by proof. It is not to be admitted that the titles by which so much property in this country and so many rights are held, purporting to emanate from the authoritative action of the officers of the government, and, as in this case, under the seal and signature of the president of the United States himself, shall be dependent upon the hazard of successful resistance to the whims and caprices of every person who chooses to attack them in a court of justice; but is should be well understood that only that class of evidence which commands respect, and that amount of it which produces conviction, shall make such an attempt successful.'

This case is even stronger in its aspects than some that have been before us, for if the particular wrong charged upon the defendants be established, the money paid is, by the second section of the act, forfeited, and there is not even the possibility suggested in the case of U. S. v. Trinidad Coal & Coking Co., 137 U. S. 160, 11 Sup. Ct. Rep. 57, of an equitable claim upon the government for its subsequent repayment. The hardship of such a result, so different from that which is always enforced in suits between individuals, makes it imperative that no decree should pass against the defendants unless the wrong be clearly and fully established.

The particular charge is that Budd, before his application, had unlawfully and fraudulently made an agreement with his co-defendant, Montgomery, by which the title he was to acquire from the United States, should inure to the benefit of such co-defendant. Upon this question, the fact that stands out prominently is that there is no direct testimony that Budd made any agreement with Montgomery, or even that they ever met, or either knew of the existence of the other, until after Budd had fully paid for the land. No witness ever knew or heard of any agreement. What, then, is the evidence upon which the government relies? It appears that Montgomery purchased quite a number of tracts of timber lands in that vicinity, some 10,000 acres, as claimed by one of the witnesses; that the title to 21 of these tracts was obtained from the government within a year, by various parties, but with the same two witnesses to the application in each case; that the purchases by Montgomery were made shortly after the payment to the government, and in two...