United States v. Portland Coal & Coke Co.

• Decision Date: 05 October 1908
• Docket Number: 1,280-1,285.
• Citation: 173 F. 566
• Court: U.S. District Court — Western District of Washington
• Parties: UNITED STATES v. PORTLAND COAL & COKE CO. et al. (six cases).

173 F. 566

UNITED STATES v. PORTLAND COAL & COKE CO. et al. (six cases).

Nos. 1,280-1,285.

United States Circuit Court, W.D. Washington.

October 5, 1908

Charles J. Bonaparte, Atty. Gen., Henry M. Hoyt, Sp. Asst. U.S Atty., Potter C. Sullivan, U.S. Dist. Atty., and Frederick G Dorety, Asst. U.S. Dist. Atty.

Snow &amp McCamant, Warren E. Thomas, and T. G. Hailey, for defendants.

HANFORD District Judge.

In these six cases the government sues to obtain decrees canceling patents issued for lands entered under the coal land law, which permits entries by individuals of not exceeding 160 acres, and by associations of not exceeding 320 acres, of public land containing coal deposits and chiefly valuable for coal mining. The several bills of complaint are similar in their allegations, and, considered together as one general complaint, they show that separate entries were made by individuals and associations, each of a quantity of land not exceeding the maximum, and that the lands were paid for and patents issued to the persons in whose names the entries were made; the aggregate quantity of land so patented being about 6,300 acres. As ground for cancellation of the patents it is averred that the entries were made in pursuance of a conspiracy between the defendants to acquire the title to a large tract of coal land, in violation of law, for the use and benefit of the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Company, a corporation, and that to effect the object of the conspiracy the Portland Coal & Coke Company has incorporated as a subsidiary corporation, dominated by the Oregon Railroad &amp Navigation Company, and that the money expended in exploring the lands for the discovery of coal, and all other incidental expenses, and for the payment to the government of the price for the lands, was furnished by the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Company.

A number of the defendants have failed to answer or plead, and decrees pro confesso have been entered against them, and all of the cases have been submitted by the United States district attorney for decision upon the bills and the several answers filed by the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Company, E. E. Lytle and wife, and McKenzie and Goss. Some of the other defendants filed answers disclaiming any interest in the property, and as to them the suits have been dismissed. The Portland Coal & Coke Company has not answered, and it appears to have ceased to exist as a corporation by reason of its failure to pay the license fee required by the laws of Oregon, under which it was incorporated.

The answer of the Oregon Railroad & Navigation Company is defensive only, to the extent of denying all averments of the bills charging it as a promoter of the Portland Coal & Coke Company and as a co-conspirator with others to acquire the land, and disclaims any right to or interest in any part thereof, and prays for a decree in its favor for costs.

The defendants Lytle and wife, by their answer, deny the ownership of the government subsequent to...