1. An appeal from a decree of the circuit court of appeals
entered prior to the Jurisdictional Act of February 13, 1925, was
not affected by that Act. P.
269 U. S.
87.
2. Under Jud.Code §§ 128, 241, a decree of the circuit court of
appeals in a case not of a class defined by § 128 as final in that
court was reviewable by appeal to this Court if involving $1,000,
exclusive of costs.
Id.
3. Upon a motion to affirm, questions determined on a former
appeal of the case, after a full hearing followed by denial of a
petition for rehearing, and which were so determined by reaffirming
and applying earlier decisions which covered the questions, cannot
reasonably be regarded as debatable. P.
269 U. S.
88.
4. On the former appeal in this case (
236 U. S. 236 U.S.
635) this Court held, in substance:
(a) The purpose of the Act of May 23, 1828, c. 70, 4 Stat. 284,
in confirming the land grant in controversy, was not to create a
new right, but to recognize, in fulfillment of treaty obligations,
a right conferred by Spain while the land was under her
dominion;
(b) As the grant contained a less acreage than a league square,
the confirmation by that Act was subject only to a needed survey
giving precision to the boundaries of the grant;
(c) When the survey was made, and received the approval of the
Surveyor General in 1851, the confirmation was complete, and the
land was thenceforth effectively separated from the public domain
and subject to the taxing power of the state;
Page 269 U. S. 83
(d) The survey did not require the special approval of the
Commissioner of the General Land Office, for, under the law and
practice of that period, the approval of the Surveyor General
sufficed;
(e) The patent, issued in 1895, was in the nature of a
convenient muniment or record of the confirmation already effected
by the Act of 1828 and the approved survey, rather than a
conveyance speaking from the date of its issue. P.
269 U. S.
86.
5. As the record shows that the original plat was approved in
1851, and the patent recites that the description of the land in
the patent was taken from the approved field notes of the original
survey, a mention in the patent of a descriptive plat and notes
"authenticated and approved" by the Surveyor General shortly before
its date obviously refers to a plat and notes made from the
approved survey of 1851 to provide a suitable description for the
patent, authentication and approval of which by the then Surveyor
General amounted to no more than a certificate that they were
accurately taken from the earlier survey as shown on the records of
his office. P.
269 U. S.
88.
6. A claimant under a Spanish grant whose claim was confirmed by
an Act of Congress and approved survey was not obliged by the Act
of March 3, 1807, c. 46, 2 Stat. 445, to abstain from acts of
proprietorship until subsequent issue of a patent. P.
269 U. S.
89.
7. When title so passed by confirmation and approved survey, the
doctrines of laches and adverse possession became applicable
against the claimant, also a local statute of limitations which did
not begin to run as to lands derived from the United States, "until
the passage of the title " from the government. P.
269 U. S.
89.
8. Concurrent findings of fact of two federal courts below,
having substantial support in the evidence, and sustaining defenses
of adverse possession and laches, are accepted by this Court. P.
269 U. S.
89.
299 F. 261 affirmed.
Appeal from a decree of the circuit court of appeals which
affirmed a decree of the district court dismissing on the merits a
suit brought by the appellants to quiet title to a confirmed land
grant in Florida. The decision now reported was made on a motion to
affirm the decree appealed from, an alternative motion to dismiss
the appeal being overruled. Upon a former appeal taken by the
Cypress Company, this Court reversed a decree which had been
rendered in favor of the plaintiffs.
See 236 U. S. 236 U.S.
635.
Page 269 U. S. 84
MR. JUSTICE VAN DEVANTER delivered the opinion of the Court.
This is a suit to quiet title to a confirmed land grant in
Florida. The plaintiffs claim as heirs of the original grantee. The
defendant claims under tax deeds, and also asserts that the
plaintiffs are barred from maintaining the suit, first by adverse
possession on the part of the defendant and those through whom it
claims for the period fixed in the local statute of limitation, and
secondly by inexcusable laches.
The grant was made in 1815 by Spain to Miguel Marcos, purported
to cover 5,500 acres, and described the land in terms which made a
survey essential to give precision to its boundaries. There was no
survey during the Spanish dominion. After the cession to the United
States, the heirs of the grantee presented a claim for confirmation
to commissioners charged by Congress with the duty of examining and
reporting on such claims. The commissioners found that the grant
valid and recommended it, with others, to Congress for
confirmation. The report stated that the grant was without any
condition. 4 Am. state Papers, Duff Green ed., pp. 276, 283,
471.
By the Act of May 23, 1828, c. 70, 4 Stat. 284. Congress acted
on the commissioners' report by confirming this and other claims,
with the general qualification that, if any claim exceeded the
number of acres in a league square, the confirmation was limited to
such acreage, to be located by the claimants, within the original
grant. That and other acts contemplated that the claims should be
surveyed by way of precisely defining their boundaries and of
connecting
Page 269 U. S. 85
them with the public land surveys. Because of delay in making
the surveys, possibly resulting from inaction on the part of
claimants, Congress, by the Act of June 28, 1848, c. 83, 9 Stat.
242, directed that the work proceed as soon as practicable. Early
in 1851, this claim was surveyed under the direction of the
Surveyor General, and, on June 20 of that year, the survey received
the approval of that officer. As surveyed, the claim contained
5,486.46 acres.
* In 1889, the
grantee's heirs applied for a patent for the claim as surveyed. The
application was denied by the Commissioner of the General Land
Office on the mistaken theory that the claim as surveyed was more
than a league square, and therefore more than was confirmed by the
Act of 1828. On an appeal from that ruling, the Secretary of the
Interior recognized that a league square, in the sense of the
confirmatory act, comprised 6,002.50 acres, and directed that a
patent issue for the claim "in accordance with the survey." 18 Land
Dec. 64. In 1895, a patent was issued under that direction.
The tax deeds under which the defendant claims were issued, the
earliest in 1852 and others before 1872. The one of 1852 may be put
out of view. The plaintiffs say in their bill that the others "are
fair upon their face," but otherwise invalid. The bill contains a
like statement respecting the mesne conveyances whereby the
defendant succeeded to the tax title.
This suit by the heirs was begun in 1907. The present appeal is
the second one to this Court.
Originally, the district court and the circuit court of appeals
ruled that the title was in the United States, and the land not
taxable, until the issue of the patent, and therefore that the tax
deeds, all of which preceded the patent, were absolutely void, and
did not give even color of title. In that view, the district court
gave and the
Page 269 U. S. 86
circuit court of appeals affirmed a decree for the plaintiffs,
without considering the conformity of the tax proceedings to the
local law or the questions arising out of the evidence bearing on
the defenses of adverse possession and laches. On the first appeal
to this Court, that view was disapproved and the decree reversed.
236 U. S. 236 U.S.
635. In keeping with prior decisions, this Court held, in
substance, that:
1. The purpose of the confirmatory Act of 1828 was not to create
a new right, but to recognize, in fulfillment of treaty
obligations, a right conferred by Spain while the land was under
her dominion.
2. As the grant contained a less acreage than a league square,
the confirmation by that Act was subject only to a needed survey
giving precision to the boundaries of the grant.
3. When the survey was made and received the approval of the
Surveyor General, the confirmation was complete, and the land was
thenceforth effectively separated from the public domain and
subject to the taxing power of the state.
4. The survey did not require the special approval of the
Commissioner of the General Land Office, for, under the law and
practice of that period, the approval of the Surveyor General
sufficed.
5. The patent was in the nature of a convenient muniment or
record of the confirmation already effected by the Act of 1828 and
the approved survey, rather than a conveyance speaking from the
date of its issue.
The cases of
Beard v.
Federy, 3 Wall. 478,
70 U. S. 497,
and
Boquillas Cattle Co. v.
Curtis, 213 U. S. 339,
213 U. S. 344,
were cited in support of the last proposition, and were pertinent;
but the proposition has further and special support in other cases,
where rights based on tax sales, adverse possession, etc.,
occurring after a like legislative confirmation and before the
issue of patent, were upheld, such as
Page 269 U. S. 87
Langdeau v.
Hanes, 21 Wall. 521,
88 U. S. 529;
Morrow v. Whitney, 95 U. S. 551,
95 U. S.
554-555;
Joplin v. Chachere, 192 U. S.
94.
On the first appeal, this Court did not pass upon the question
of the conformity of the tax proceedings to the local law, nor on
those arising out of the evidence bearing on the defenses of
adverse possession and laches. They had not been considered in the
courts below, and were of a kind that should be examined and
determined in the first instance by the district court, and then,
if need be, by the circuit court of appeals. The decree of reversal
was so framed as to require that this course be taken.
When the case got back to the district court, it was heard anew
on the record before made. That court found that the defenses of
adverse possession and laches were well taken in fact and in law,
and accordingly entered a decree dismissing the bill on the merits.
The circuit court of appeals affirmed that decree. 299 F. 261. The
plaintiffs then brought the case here on the present appeal.
Various motions have been submitted on briefs. One by the
appellee asks that the appeal be dismissed, as taken where an
appeal was not admissible, or, in the alternative, that the decree
be affirmed, on the ground that the questions presented are so
unsubstantial as not to need further argument.
See Rule 6,
par. 5, 222 U.S. appendix and 266 U.S. appendix.
The motion to dismiss must be denied. The appeal was taken under
§§ 128 and 241 of the Judicial Code, as existing when the decree of
affirmance by the circuit court of appeals was entered, and is not
affected by the subsequent Act of February 13, 1925, c. 229, 43
Stat. 936. Section 128 provided that the decisions of the circuit
courts of appeals in certain classes of cases should be final, in
the sense of being not reviewable by this Court on writ of error or
appeal, and § 241 provided that
Page 269 U. S. 88
the decisions of those courts in other cases should be subject
to such a review where the matter in controversy, exclusive of
costs, exceeded $1,000. This suit was not within any of the classes
named in § 128, and the matter in controversy exceeded $1,000,
apart from costs. Therefore, the suit was one in which an appeal
was admissible.
The motion to affirm is well taken. A reference to the questions
presented and to what is plainly shown in the record will make this
clear.
The appellants seek to reopen the questions determined on the
first appeal. A full hearing was had at that time. The questions
were not novel, but covered by prior decisions. As a result of the
hearing, those decisions were reaffirmed and applied. There was
also a petition for rehearing, which was denied. In this situation,
the questions reasonably cannot be regarded as now debatable.
The contention is made that the decision on that appeal
proceeded on the assumption that the survey was approved by the
Surveyor General in 1951, whereas, according to the record, the
approval was given shortly before the patent issued, which was in
1895. But the record is plainly otherwise. It contains a certified
copy of the original plat of the survey, as made in January, 1851,
by Marcellus A. Williams, deputy surveyor, and the plat bears an
indorsement signed by the then Surveyor General, showing that he
examined it, compared it with the field notes, and approved it,
June 20, 1851. In addition, the patent recites that the description
there given of the land was "taken from the approved field notes"
of Williams' survey made in January, 1851. True, the patent also
refers to a descriptive plat and notes "authenticated and approved"
by the Surveyor General shortly before the date of the patent; but
it is obvious from the patent and other parts of the record that
the descriptive plat and notes so mentioned were made up from the
approved survey of 1951 merely as a means of providing a
suitable
Page 269 U. S. 89
and convenient description of the land for insertion in the
patent. Their authentication and approval by the then Surveyor
General amounted to no more than a certificate by him that they
were accurately taken from the survey made and approved in 1851, as
shown on the records of his office.
See Joplin v. Chachere,
supra, 192 U. S. 102,
192 U. S.
107.
A further contention is that there could be no laches, nor any
adverse possession, prior to the issue of patent, because the
claimants were prohibited by the Act of March 3, 1807, c. 46, 2
Stat. 445, from exercising acts of proprietorship until their claim
was "recognized and confirmed" by the United States. A complete
answer to this is that their claim was both recognized and
confirmed by the Act of 1828, and the confirmation became effective
when the claim was surveyed and the survey approved in 1851. The
subsequent patent, although serving as a convenient muniment of
title as confirmed, added nothing to the force of the confirmation.
Langdeau v. Hanes, supra, 88 U. S. 530,
and other cases before cited.
Reliance is also had on a provisions in the local statute of
limitation declaring that, as respects lands derived from the
United States, the period of limitation should not begin to run
"until the passage of the title" from the government. The answer to
the last contention is equally good here. Such title as the United
States possessed passed to the claimants when the confirmation
became effective through the approved survey. The cases just cited
are conclusive on this point.
Lastly, complaint is made of the findings of fact sustaining the
defenses of adverse possession and laches. The courts below
concurred in these findings, and explained them in considered
opinions. The record shows with certainty that the findings had
very substantial support in the evidence. This Court accepts
concurrent findings with such support.
Morewood
v. Enequist, 23 How. 491,
64 U. S. 495;
Page 269 U. S. 90
Stuart v. Hayden, 169 U. S. 1,
169 U. S. 14;
National Bank of Athens v. Shackelford, 239 U. S.
81,
239 U. S. 82;
Yuma County Water Assn. v. Schlecht, 262 U.
S. 138,
262 U. S. 146;
United States v. State Investment Co., 264 U.
S. 206,
264 U. S.
211.
No question is presented which can be regarded as debatable in
this Court, so there is no need for holding the case for further
argument.
Decree affirmed.
* In some parts of the record, the acreage is mistakenly given
as 5,426.82.
