Vill. of Crosse Pointe Shores v. Ayres

• Decision Date: 07 April 1931
• Docket Number: No. 132.,132.
• Citation: 254 Mich. 58,235 N.W. 829
• Parties: VILLAGE OF CROSSE POINTE SHORES v. AYRES et al.
• Court: Michigan Supreme Court

254 Mich. 58

235 N.W. 829

VILLAGE OF CROSSE POINTE SHORES

v.AYRES et al.

No. 132.

Supreme Court of Michigan.

April 7, 1931.

Appeal from Circuit Court, Wayne County, in Chancery; Henry H. Smith, Judge.

Action for declaratory judgment by the Village of Grosse Pointe Shores against Clarence L. Ayres and others. Judgment for plaintiff, and defendants appeal.

Affirmed in part, and reversed in part.

Argued before the Entire Bench. Lightner, Oxtoby, Hanley, Crawford & Dodd, of Detroit (A. George Abbott, of Detroit, of counsel), for appellants.

Elroy O. Jones, of Detroit (Raymond K. Dykema and Renville Wheat, both of Detroit, of counsel), for appellee.

FEAD, J.

Under contract and agreed plan of construction and maintenance, plaintiff and the county road commission of Wayne county undertook the widening to 120 feet of a 66-foot street in the village of Grosse Pointe Shores, plaintiff to secure the right of way. The plan contemplated a street of boulevard style, with 22-foot parkways on the outside, two 27-foot driveways, and a 22-foot parkway in the center. Some of the abutting owners conveyed lands to plaintiff for the street on forms drafted by the village attorney. Defendants ‘conveyed and dedicated’ lands ‘for the purpose of a highway known as Lake Shore Road’ by a different form of deed prepared by their own lawyers. The dedications were formally and unconditionally accepted by resolution of the village council.

Both forms described the street planned and provided that the east and west parkways shall always remain unpaved. The action arises over the following special conditions in defendants' deeds:

‘(6) No sidewalk, storm-water sewer, water-main, or underground public utility conduits or any other future installed public utility shall occupy the easterly twenty-two (22) feet of the road, all of which, if and when installed shall be placed as far as practicable in or under the unpaved parkway between the two paved roadbeds, otherwise may be placed under the pavement or in or under the westerly twenty-two (22) feet of the road. The three parkways of approximately twenty-two (22) feet shall for all time be continued as such parkways and shall never be used for widening the paved portions of said roadbeds.

‘(7) Should said highway ever be widened by condemnation proceedings or by other than voluntary dedication, or any of the terms of this conveyance and dedication be violated, or any portion of said parkways ever be used for widening the paved portions of said roadbeds, then the property herein conveyed and dedicated with all improvements thereon, shall automatically revert to said first parties, their heirs, executors, administrators or assigns. The express conditions hereof shall be strictly complied with and shall be construed in favor of the first parties, and is the moving and principal consideration hereof.

‘(8) For the purpose of clarity, it is understood that this dedication is made by the first parties with the distinct understanding that the consideration for it is a road with two distinct paved roadbeds and an unpaved boulevard parkway between as shown by the blueprints hereto attached; that the first parties would not make a free dedication and give to said village said land for any other kind of roadway other than that shown in the blueprints hereto attached, and that if and/or when said village or its municipal successor or successors impose any other plan of roadway or otherwise violate any of the provisions of this deed of dedication, then and in that event, the property herein dedicated shall automatically revert to the first parties, their heirs, executors, administrators or assigns.'

This is a proceeding under the Declaratory Judgment Law, C. L. 1929, § 13903, to determine and declare the effect of these conditions, which plaintiff contends are void and defendants urge are valid. The circuit court held with plaintiff. The first consideration is to define the issue.

A requisite to the proceeding is an actual controversy over a specific issue to be set up in the pleadings, in order that a binding declaration of rights may be made thereon. The proceeding is special, is not a substitute for the regular actions, and is not an exercise of general equity jurisdiction in which the court may grant consequential relief under a general prayer or upon general equitable considerations. Washington-Detroit Theatre Co. v. Moore, 249 Mich. 673, 229 N. W. 618, 68 A. L. R. 105; 50 A. L. R. 42, 19 A. L. R. 1124, 12 A. L. R. 52, notes.

In the pleadings, plaintiff alleged and defendants admitted that the deeds and acceptance ‘constitute a good and valid dedication of the land described therein for highway purposes.’ Hence the issue is upon the validity of conditions subsequent in an effective dedication to plaintiff.

Defendants' claim, upon the oral testimony, that the acceptance of the dedication was tainted with fraud and the grant should be annulled is not within the scope of the action. The claim is that, before accepting the dedication, plaintiff had advice of counsel that the above conditions were void and did not affect the grant, and then accepted it, although defendants, in delivering the deeds, had insisted upon their rejection in case the conditions were not satisfactory to plaintiff. To raise such issue would require pleadings which would convert the proceeding into a regular action by proper allegations of fact and a prayer for affirmative relief. Defendants did not so plead.

The court will not decide as to future rights, especially where, by reason of extraneous circumstances creating estoppel or otherwise, the situation may become so changed that a declaration now might be obsolete when the need for it arises. Washington-Detroit Theatre Co. v. Moore, supra. A change in the present plan of the street by which parkways will be paved or the street widened is not now contemplated by any of the parties and its possibility is too remote to afford a basis for a declaration of rights at this time. The pleadings and proofs disclose no actual controversy between the parties regarding the conditions of the dedication except in respect of the installation...