United States v. Reynolds, 9485.

• Decision Date: 12 November 1940
• Docket Number: No. 9485.,9485.
• Citation: 115 F.2d 294
• Parties: UNITED STATES ex rel. and for Use of TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY v. REYNOLDS et al.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Fifth Circuit

115 F.2d 294 (1940)

UNITED STATES ex rel. and for Use of TENNESSEE VALLEY AUTHORITY v. REYNOLDS et al.

No. 9485.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Fifth Circuit.

November 12, 1940.

Benj. H. Craig, of Florence, Ala., William C. Fitts, Jr., of Knoxville, Tenn., and H. James Hitching, of Chattanooga, Tenn., for appellant.

Clopper Almon and Jos. H. Nathan, both of Sheffield, Ala., for appellees.

Before HUTCHESON, HOLMES and McCORD, Circuit Judges.

HUTCHESON, Circuit Judge.

Proceeding under Section 831x,¹ Title 16 U.S.C.A., the United States, depositing as its estimate of just compensation, $4,143.41, brought this proceeding to condemn land for the use of the Tennessee Valley Authority. The commissioners conducted a hearing, took testimony, personally inspected the property and rendered an award of $4,543.75. The statutory court of three judges in its turn, awarded $5,443.75. In doing so the judges did not view the property as they had, under the statute, a right to do. They heard the matter upon the proceedings had before the commissioners, the testimony of two additional witnesses, and upon unsworn statements made by counsel in response to questions by the court, concerning prices paid by the government for other lands required in that vicinity and particularly concerning the award of $5,554.60, made by the commissioners and paid by the government for an adjoining tract, set apart to Rosa May Reynolds, the landowner's sister, in a purported equal division of an estate. Dissatisfied with the award, the United States has appealed and here complaining of it, insists that it was erroneous both in amount and in the manner of arriving at it. Urging primarily; that upon the evidence in the record, properly to be considered, the award of the District Judges exceeds just compensation for the property condemned; and secondarily that it was thus arrived at because the judges erroneously took into consideration, unsworn statements of amounts paid by the United States for other properties, and particularly the award of the commissioners and the payment to Rosa May Reynolds; it asks us under the statute to fix the value of the property condemned without regard to the awards or findings theretofore made by the commissioners and the District Judges. Contrasting the testimony of its witnesses, two land appraisers in the employ of the Tennessee Valley Authority, and two farmers and landowners living in the neighborhood of the land condemned, with the testimony of the landowner and his witnesses, the United States insists that its testimony presents a fair and reasonable effort by persons familiar with values to fix a reasonable value on the land while that of the landowner and of all but one of his witnesses, based largely upon what they thought the land would produce, was speculative and without real probative value.

Pointing out that the landowner's witnesses, except one who fixed the value at from $4,800 to $5,000, and one who put it at $6,480, put it at $8,640, and that the award of the District Judges was $5448, the government insists that it is perfectly plain that that award was not...