When a decree in equity in a suit relating to public land gives
the boundaries of the tract the claim to which is confirmed with
precision and has become final by stipulation of the United States
and the withdrawal of their appeal therefrom, it is conclusive not
only on the question of title, but also as to the boundaries which
it specifies.
Proof that a surveyor of public land who in the course of his
official duty surveyed a tract which had been confirmed under a
Mexican land grant, accepted from the grantee some years after the
survey a deed of a portion of the tract, which he subsequently sold
for $1,500, though it may be the subject of criticism, is not the
"clear, convincing and unambiguous" proof of fraud which is
required to set aside a patent of public land.
Doubts respecting the correctness of a survey of public land
which was made in good faith and passed unchallenged for fifteen
years should be resolved in favor of the title as patented.
This was a bill filed to set aside a patent. The facts were
these:
In 1843 Michael White petitioned for a tract of land at the
mouth of the Cajon de los Mejicanos. This petition was sustained
and a grant made by Governor Manuel Micheltorena, the Mexican
Governor of the Californias, which read:
"Whereas Don Michael White, a Mexican by naturalization, has
petitioned for his own benefit and that of his family for the place
known by the name of 'Muscupiabe,' bounded on the north by the foot
of the mountain, on the south by Agua Caliente, and on the west by
the 'Alisos' (sycamores), which are on the other side of the creek
called 'De los Negros,' having practiced the proceedings and
relative observation according to the direction of the laws and
regulations; exercising
Page 133 U. S. 194
the authority conferred upon me in the name of the Mexican
nation, I have concluded to grant him the aforesaid land, declaring
it to be his property by the present letters, subject to the
approval of the most excellent departmental assembly in and under
the following conditions."
"
* * * *"
"3d. The land of which grant is hereby made consists of one
league (
un sitio de ganada mayor), a little more or less,
according to the explanation of the diagram which is attached to
the respective 'expediente.'"
"The judge that shall give the possession shall cause it to be
measured in conformity with the ordinance, reserving the overplus
that may result to the nation for convenient uses."
On February 8, 1853, a petition for confirmation was presented
in the name of the original grantee to the board of commissioners
appointed to ascertain and settle private land claims, and on March
6, 1855, the grant was confirmed by an order in these words:
"In this case, on hearing the proofs and allegations, it is
adjudged by the commission that the claim of the petitioner is
valid, and it is therefore decreed that his application for a
confirmation be allowed, with the following boundaries, to-wit: on
north and east by the foot of the mountains, on the south by the
Agua Caliente, and on the west by the cottonwoods, which are on the
other side of the creek, reference being had to the map
accompanying the expediente."
An appeal was taken from this order of confirmation, but was
dismissed on June 8, 1857. This confirmation was not
challenged.
In 1867, instructions were issued by the surveyor general of
California for the survey, and the survey as made and returned to
the surveyor general's office was by him approved, and, on July 11,
186S, forwarded to Washington. This survey in January, 1871, was
disapproved by the Secretary of the Interior as not conforming to
the decree of confirmation, and a new survey ordered. On June 10,
1872, the surveyor general reported that he had examined the
original title papers and had compared them with the calls of the
decree of confirmation,
Page 133 U. S. 195
and had caused an examination to be made of the premises, and
that therefrom he found that a survey made in strict accordance
with the boundary calls of the decree of confirmation would include
something like a league more of land than the present survey, and
that the owners of the grant were satisfied with the present
survey, and therefore suggested the propriety of accepting it. This
report was returned to the Secretary of the Interior, by him
approved, and, on June 22, 1872, the patent was issued. This bill
was filed on May 29, 1885. The bill charged that the surveyor,
Henry Hancock, who made the survey was the real owner of a large
interest in the grant, although the title was nominally in another
party; that concealing his interest, he secured his appointment as
deputy surveyor, and in making the survey fraudulently included
within its limits about twenty-six thousand acres more of land than
justly belonged therein; that without any knowledge of the
fraudulent acts of Hancock in the premises, the surveyor general
thereafter published the required notice of the survey in a
newspaper published in the City of Los Angeles, a city of another
county and over fifty miles from the land, whereas, at the time,
there was a newspaper published within the county and within two
miles of the land. It also charged that after the survey had been
disapproved by the Secretary of the Interior, Hancock fraudulently
represented to the surveyor general that a correct survey would
include about one league in addition to what was embraced within
the present survey, but that the owners were content to take the
survey as it stood, and that, induced by and relying upon these
fraudulent representations, the surveyor general made the report
and recommendation heretofore mentioned. The circuit court, on
final hearing, dismissed the bill, and the United States appealed
to this Court.
MR. JUSTICE BREWER, after stating the facts as above, delivered
the opinion of the Court.
Page 133 U. S. 196
It is obvious that the confirmation was of a tract with
specified boundaries, and, as such, covered all the land within
those boundaries, irrespective of quantity, and this
notwithstanding there appeared in the prior proceedings statements
that the tract contained a certain amount, "a little more or less,"
which amount was very much less than that included within the
boundaries.
"When a decree gives the boundaries of the tract to which the
claim is confirmed with precision, and has become final by
stipulation of the United States, and the withdrawal of their
appeal therefrom, it is conclusive not only on the question of
title, but also as to the boundaries which it specifies."
United States v.
Halleck, 1 Wall. 439;
United
States v. Billing, 2 Wall. 444;
Higueras
v. United States, 5 Wall. 827. And the Act of
Congress of July 1, 1864, 13 Stat. U.S. 334, ยง 7, requires the
surveyor general,
"in making surveys of the private land claims finally confirmed,
to follow the decree of confirmation as closely as practicable,
whenever such decree designates the specific boundaries of the
claim."
The charge of fraudulent misconduct on the part of the surveyor,
Hancock, is not substantiated. Mr. Hancock was not appointed
surveyor with reference to this survey. He was the regular deputy
surveyor for this district, having been appointed more than ten
years prior thereto. While at one time he had owned an interest in
the grant, he had, more than eight years before the survey, sold
and conveyed it, for a full consideration, to his brother, and from
that time forward, during all these proceedings, was without any
interest in the premises. It is true that during these years Mr.
Hancock acted as the general agent of his brother, and that is all
the ground there is to suspect wrong on his part. There is not a
syllable of testimony that after the secretary had ordered the new
survey, Mr. Hancock had anything to do with the matter, either in
suggestion, recommendation, or otherwise, so that the report of the
surveyor general was not made by virtue of anything that Hancock
had said or done. The examination referred to by the surveyor
general in his report was made by one R. C. Hopkins under the
direction of the surveyor general, a person who was at the time, so
far as the testimony discloses, entirely disinterested.
Page 133 U. S. 197
It is true there is testimony, furnished by Mr. Hopkins himself,
that sometime after the patent had been issued, he accepted a deed
of a portion of this grant as a present from the owners -- a tract
which he subsequently sold for $1,500. Whatever criticism may be
placed upon the acceptance of this gift -- a gift made long after
his relations to the survey had ceased -- it certainly does not
establish dereliction in his discharge of prior official duty.
These matters, together with the failure to publish notice in the
nearest paper, are all the evidences of fraud in the transaction.
Not only are they not "the clear, convincing, and unambiguous"
proofs of fraud required to set aside a patent, as declared by this
Court in the case of
Colorado Coal Co. v. United States,
123 U. S. 317,
but they, all combined, create nothing more than a suspicion. They
may leave a doubt, but they do not bring the assurance of certain
wrong. Some question is made as to the correctness of the survey,
and that turns, as a question of fact, upon what is meant by the
expression "Agua Caliente" in the various descriptions. If it means
a stream known as Agua Caliente, then the government has no cause
to challenge the survey, for it includes less than was really
confirmed; but if it means a district of country known by that
name, in the northwestern portion of the San Bernardino rancho -- a
neighboring tract -- then the survey was excessive. If it were
necessary for us to determine this question, we think the evidence
in the case indicates that the stream, and not the district, was
intended; but it is not the province of this Court to correct a
mere matter of survey like that. If made in good faith, and
unchallenged, as this has been, for over fifteen years, whatever
doubts may exist as to its correctness must be resolved in favor of
the title as patented.
We see no error in the decree, and it is
Affirmed.
MR. JUSTICE FIELD takes no part in this decision.