Yuba Goldfields, Inc. v. U.S.
| Decision Date | 14 December 1983 |
| Docket Number | No. 83-912,83-912 |
| Citation | 723 F.2d 884 |
| Parties | YUBA GOLDFIELDS, INC. and Placer Service Corp., Appellants, v. The UNITED STATES, Appellee. Appeal |
| Court | U.S. Court of Appeals — Federal Circuit |
John J. Dacey, and M. Reed Hunter, San Francisco, Cal., for appellants.
Glen R. Goodsell, Washington, D.C., for appellee. With him on brief were F. Henry Habicht, II and David C. Skilton, Washington, D.C.
Before MARKEY, Chief Judge, and FRIEDMAN and BALDWIN, Circuit Judges.
Appeal from an order of the Claims Court, 1 Cl.Ct. 421, dismissing the complaint in light of a motion of the United States for summary judgment, on the ground that actions of the United States did not constitute a taking of private property. We vacate the order and remand.
In 1901, James O'Brien quitclaimed the subject property to the United States, reserving to himself the precious metal interests. In 1902, those interests were conveyed to R.D. Evans, who in turn conveyed them to Yuba Goldfields, Inc., in 1905, which thus owned the right to extract precious metals from an area of land the underlying fee in which is owned by the United States. Yuba Goldfields, Inc. (herein, with its joint venturer Placer Service Corp., called "Yuba") mined the area continuously (with minor interruption) since 1905. In 1975 and 1976, the U.S. Corps of Engineers wrote Yuba, stating, inter alia, that Yuba had no extraction or other rights, that Yuba would be held accountable for removal of In extended negotiations, the United States adhered to its position that Yuba had no rights and that the United States' asserted rights would be strictly enforced. By 1979, Yuba and the Corps of Engineers reached and signed an agreed settlement. That settlement died, however, when the Secretary of the Army declined to approve it.
any precious metals that may legally belong to the government, that in view of a decision by the Attorney General of the United States the government's ownership of the precious metals would be enforced, and that "Dredging activity or removal of any material, including precious metals is prohibited."
On June 12, 1980, Yuba sued in the United States District Court of California (No. Civ. 80-480 MLS) to confirm its title to the mineral interest. Yuba also petitioned in the Court of Claims (No. 40-80L), seeking just compensation for the period of time (since 1976) over which it had been denied opportunity to mine the area by what it viewed as the temporary taking of its mineral interest in violation of the Fifth Amendment to the Constitution. The petition was transferred to the Claims Court as required by 28 U.S.C. Sec. 171, Federal Courts Improvement Act of 1982, Pub.L. No. 97-164, Sec. 403(a), 96 Stat. 25, 57.
On August 10, 1981, the district court granted summary judgment to Yuba, holding that the claim of the United States to the mineral right was unsound. The United States dismissed its appeal from that judgment on January 4, 1982. Since that date, Yuba has been free to again exercise its right to extract precious metals from the land.
In the Claims Court, the United States filed what it called a "Motion for Summary Judgment." Accompanied by no affidavits, the motion partook more of the nature of a motion to dismiss. In view of the action of the Claims Court now on review, however, dispute on the proper label for the United States' motion is in this case academic.
By way of summary judgment, the Claims Court denied all relief to Yuba for the six years during which it claimed it was prevented by the United States from exercising its property right to extract precious metals from the area. That judgment was accompanied by an opinion establishing that the motion was not granted on grounds raised in the United States' motion, but on the following views of the trial judge:
(1) There was no taking because the United States "did not take possession of the subject property, nor did it physically bar plaintiffs from its use."
(2) There was no taking where, as here, the United States "acts in good faith to protect what it deems to be its property."
(3) There is no liability because the United States acted in a proprietary rather than in a sovereign capacity.
The Claims Court opinion says: (a) the action of the United States here was one in which it "only asserted a claim to its rightful ownership subject to judicial determination;" (b) that "at most" the United States told Yuba it would be held accountable for government property extracted; (c) that such an assertion by a private individual would not be deemed a taking; (d) that the Fifth Amendment does not require compensation for actions by the United States that are not a taking pursuant to its authority as sovereign. The opinion cited as authority DSI Corp. v. United States, 655 F.2d 1072, 228 Ct.Cl. 299 (1981) and Sun Oil Co. v. United States, 572 F.2d 786, 215 Ct.Cl. 716 (1978), and discussed what were viewed as factors distinguishing Foster v. United States, 607 F.2d 943, 221 Ct.Cl. 412 (1979), Bourgeois v. United States, 545 F.2d 727, 212 Ct.Cl. 32 (1976), and Yaist v. United States, 656 F.2d 616, 228 Ct.Cl. 281 (1981), relied upon by Yuba. Other than their appearance in an extended quotation of the Corps of Engineers' letters, the United States' statements that its rights would be "enforced" and that Yuba's dredging operations were "prohibited" are not referred to in the opinion.
Whether the Claims Court erred in its grant of summary judgment.
OPINIONWe deal here with government action differing from a straight forward exercise of the eminent domain power to condemn and acquire a citizen's property. Over the years courts have recognized that the Fifth Amendment requirement for payment of just compensation is equally applicable to government action otherwise labeled but having the effect of such exercise. See Eyherabide v. United States, 345 F.2d 565, 170 Ct.Cl. 598 (1965) and cases cited therein. Thus a "taking" may result not only upon exercise of the power of eminent domain, but also upon government action describable as "inverse condemnation."
As the literature emphasizes, the law of just compensation is hardly a model of clarity. Professor Arvo Van Alstyne describes it as "[w]ith some exceptions ... largely characterized by confusing and incompatible results, often explained in conclusionary terminology, circular reasoning, and empty rhetoric." Van Alstyne, Taking or Damaging by Police Power: The Search for Inverse Condemnation Criteria, 44 S.C.L.Rev. 1, 2 (1970). Professor Joseph Sax notes that "the predominant characteristic of this area of law is a welter of confusing and apparently incompatible results." Sax, Takings and the Police Power, 74 Yale L.J. 36, 37 (1964). In Griggs v. Allegheny County in Perspective: 30 Years of Supreme Court Expropriation Law, 1962 Sup.Ct.Rev. 63, Professor Allison Dunham said decisions in this area are characterized by a "crazyquilt pattern." Professor Frank Michelman described just compensation law as "liberally salted with paradox," and pointed to "jarring outcomes" that are "surprising to the uninitiated." Michelman, Property, Utility, and Fairness: Comments on the Ethical Foundations of "Just Compensation" Law, 80 Harv.L.Rev. 1165, 1169-1170 (1967).
Nor can this one opinion on review of a summary judgment be expected to replace decisional discord with harmony. Dissatisfaction of the writers with apparent disorder resulting from consideration of each case on its own facts will not be alleviated by a requirement that the present case be decided after trial on facts found by the trial judge and on legal conclusions based on those facts. That requirement is nonetheless dictated by the present record.
The fact-intensive nature of just compensation jurisprudence to date, however disorienting in other contexts, argues against precipitous grants of summary judgment. There may well be just compensation cases in which the United States as the moving party is "entitled to judgment as a matter of law, and where it is quite clear what the truth is ...." Sartor v. Arkansas Natural Gas Corp., 321 U.S. 620, 627, 64 S.Ct. 724, 728, 88 L.Ed. 967 (1944). There may be such cases. This is not one of them.
The trial judge erred as a matter of law in concluding that there could be no taking where the United States "did not take possession" of the disputed property and did not "physically bar plaintiffs from its use." No authority was or could be cited for that proposition. Indeed, the law is to the contrary. Neither physical invasion nor physical restraint constitutes a sine qua non of a constitutionally controlled taking. Penn Central Transp. Co. v. New York City, 438 U.S. 104, 98 S.Ct. 2646, 57 L.Ed.2d 631 (1978).
Beyond the irrelevancy of possession and restraint, the record does not support an assumption that they were absent here. The United States possessed the land and "prohibited" Yuba's dredging. It is difficult to see what more might be done, other than dredging by the United States, to enable the United States to possess the minerals themselves. Similarly, no requirement for physical restraint would arise unless and until Yuba elected to defy its government's prohibition and attempt to renew its dredging activities. Yuba should have the opportunity at trial to establish the validity of its argument here that a prudently conducted, publicly owned business corporation cannot be expected to undertake the risks it asserts were present in such defiance. On consideration of the motion, Yuba was entitled to that inference. United States v. Diebold, Inc., 369 U.S. 654, 655, 82 S.Ct. 993, 994, 8 L.Ed.2d 176 (1962).
The trial court's view that possession and physical restraint were required caused it to distinguish Foster, supra, on irrelevant grounds. In Foster, the United States acquired land subject to mineral rights owned by certain citizens. When the...
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