113 Ind. 581 | Ind. | 1888
In 1855 Martha Thompson owned the land involved in this controversy. During that year, the New Castle and Danville Railroad Company surveyed a line of road, and set stakes marking the line surveyed. Nothing further was done until 1869 or 1870, when the Indianapolis, Crawfordsville and Danville Railroad Company entered on ■the land in dispute and constructed a railroad, claiming the right to do so as the successor of the former company, and for a time operated and maintained a railroad'carrying mails, passengers and freight, as railroad companies usually do. To
The general rule is, that where land is seized by a railroad company .without right, the owner may maintain ejectment. Graham v. Columbus, etc., R. W. Co., 27 Ind. 260 (89 Am. Dec. 498); Graham v. Connersville, etc., R. R. Co., 36 Ind. 463; Cox v. Louisville, etc., R. R. Co., 48 Ind. 178 (194); Sharpe v. St. Louis, etc., R. W. Co., 49 Ind. 296; Terre Haute, etc., R. R. Co. v. Rodel, 89 Ind. 128.
The principle which underlies this rule is the same as that which supports the general rule that an owner may maintain injunction against a corporation which seizes his land without right. Anderson, etc., R. R. Co. v. Kernodle, 54 Ind. 314; Midland R. W. Co. v. Smith, ante, p. 233.
But the rule of which we arc speaking is a general rule, subject to many exceptions, and to more restrictions than ■ordinarily surround general rules. One important excep
Vast interests are often involved in the maintenance of railroads. They are charged with a public service, and a public character is so strongly impressed upon them that courts exercise a control over them much beyond that assumed over individual citizens. They are recognized as instruments of interstate commerce, and as such are within the control of the Federal Congress. Robbins v. Shelby Taxing Dist., 120 U. S. 494; State Freight Tax, 15 Wall. 232; Railroad Co. v. Maryland, 21 Wall. 456.
They may exercise rights under the power of eminent domain because of their public character. Towns spring into-existence along their lines. Factories, elevators and warehouses are built upon them. The mails of the nation are-carried by them. They are common carriers of freight and passengers. All these interests, and more, combine in demanding that a citizen, who has stood by until after the completion of a line of road has involved public interests, shall not be allowed to sever the line and destroy its efficiency by wresting possession of part of it from the company. The case does not stand upon the ordinary doctrine of estoppel. The great principle of public policy enters as an important factor and controls'the judgment of the court. Nor is there any great hardship upon the land-owner in yielding to its dominion. Ample remedies are open to him. He may demand and secure full compensation. He may do more, for he may invoke the aid of the strong arm of the courts, but, to do this with success, he must move before public interests are involved. If he remains inactive, better that he suffer, if some one must suffer, than the community. But he need not suffer, for compensation, if seasonably asked, will always be awarded him, although possession-will be denied.
We do not controvert the doctrine that acquiescence will not preclude a recovery of damages; that we affirm to be the true doctrine. Unless prolonged until the statute of limita
We do not, therefore, question the soundness of the cases which hold that, within the statute of limitations, a claim for compensation, made by one entitled to assert it, may be enforced. Rusch v. Milwaukee, etc., R. R. Co., 11 N. W. Rep. 253; Evans v. Missouri, etc., R. W. Co., 64 Mo. 453.
Our decision does not impugn the general doctrine of such cases, but it does assert that they do not support the contention that one who has remained inactive until public interests have intervened, can not dispossess the railroad company and thus break the line of communication.
If the appellee’s grantor was not under such a disability as prevented her silence from operating against her, she could not have maintained this action unless the decree in the suit to quiet title so conclusively adjudicates the question of title and possession as to preclude the appellant from again bringing it in issue. Leaving that decree out of consideration, we think it clear that the disability of coverture can not avail in such a case as this, where public rights are involved. This is our conclusion, without regard to the change effected by the acts of 1879 and 1881. If the common law, in all its rigor, were the governing rule, the disability of coverture would be of no avail. Before public interests such-disabilities must give way. To the welfare of the public such things must yield. We regard the principle which rules here the same as that affirmed in City of Indianapolis v. Kingsbury, 101 Ind. 200, 219. In that case it was held that a married woman who acquiesced in the use of a street by the public would not be allowed to reclaim the land. Authorities were there cited fully sustaining that doctrine. Nor is there any difficulty in sustaining it, for, in cases of condemnation and dedication, as shown by the authorities there cited, the ordinary rules do not apply. Certainly, this must be so
If we are right in the conclusions we have asserted, then it results that this action can not be maintained unless the rights of the appellee were conclusively established in the suit to quiet title brought in February, 1883. The complaint in that suit consisted of three paragraphs. Two of them were for possession ; the third averred that the plaintiffs were the owners in fee, and that the adverse claim of the appellant was unjust and unfounded, and prayed that their title be quieted against the defendant.
Issue was joined, the cause was tried by the .court, and a decree rendered against the appellant. The decree was based on the third paragraph of the complaint; the other two were withdrawn. The decree adjudges that prior to the 15th day of August, 1882, Martha E. Brittingham owned the land in fee, and on that day conveyed it by a warranty deed to the appellee; that the claim of the defendant is unjust and unfounded, and that the plaintiff’s title be forever quieted and set at rest. It was further provided in the decree that nothing contained in it should prevent either party from having the damages assessed, and that nothing contained in it should prevent either party from claiming the iron and cross-ties laid on the land.
In Green v. Glynn, 71 Ind. 336, it was said : “ The very object of the action to quiet title is to determine all conflicting claims, and to remove all clouds from the title of the complainant. If one having a claim is brought into court by a complaint to quiet title, and fails to assert his claim, he is concluded by the judgment, even though he omitted to assert his real claim. The statute was intended to secure repose and to settle in one comprehensive action all conflicting claims.”
It was said in Farrar v. Clark, 97 Ind. 447, that “ Our own cases have steadily maintained the doctrine that the action is intended to settle in one proceeding all claims and to put an end to all litigation concerning the title.” In many cases it has been asserted that a decree in an action to quiet title, as well as in kindred actions where title is directly put in issue, cuts off all claims of the unsuccessful party, except such as are expressly saved by the decree. Ulrich v. Drischell, 88 Ind. 354; Cooter v. Baston, 89 Ind. 185, and authorities cited p. 186; Stumph v. Reger, 92 Ind. 286; Ragsdale v. Mitchell, 97 Ind. 458; Faught v. Faught, 98 Ind. 470; Watkins v. Winings, 102 Ind. 330.
This rule is as old in this court as the often cited ease of Fischli v. Fischli, 1 Blackf. 360 (12 Am. Dec. 251), for the whole title with all its incidents is involved in the issue and is necessarily adjudicated, and unless only partial title is in issue, or it is otherwise provided, all questions of title are conclusively settled, no matter what their form or character. The authorities elsewhere support our decisons. Pomeroy Rem., section 369; Freeman Judg., section 305.
In Reed v. Calderwood, 32 Cal. 109, it was held that a. decree in an action to quiet title is a bar to further litigation upon that subject, and this principle was asserted by the court in the earlier cases. Merced Mining Co. v. Fremont, 7 Cal. 317; Curtis v. Sutter, 15 Cal. 259.
Mr. Freeman says: “If the defendant recover judgment on the merits, in a proceeding to quiet title under the statute authorizing suits to determine conflicting claims to real estate, the fact that he has a title is as conclusively established as a judgment in favor of the plaintiff would have established that defendant had no title.” At another place the author quotes, with approval, the language of the court in Starr v. Stark, 1 Sawy. C. C. 270: “By the final decree in such a suit, the title to the premises, as between the parties, is determined, and all questions or matters affecting such title are concluded thereby. If either party omits to set forth and
In Dumont v. Dufore, 27 Ind. 263, in speaking of the ■effect of a decree to quiet title, it was said: “ Of what avail, then, can it be to the plaintiff to have the title quieted in him, when, after that is done, he can not recover possession upon it? Equity will not grant a relief in form which must be valueless in fact.”
In Smith v. Bryan, 74 Ind. 515, it was said: “ It would be idle to quiet a title that could never be carried into possession.”
It was said in Farrar v. Clark, supra, where the question was as to the effect of a decree in an action to quiet title, that “ It is a mistake to suppose that the object of a suit to •quiet title is to settle particular claims; on the contrary, it is, as was said, in substance, in Barton v. McWhinney, 85 Ind. 481, an action to quiet the plaintiff’s title against all claims of the defendant, whatever they may be. If, then, all claims are-included, all claims are necessarily finally adjudicated, and the question of title forever settled.”
We have shown that it is agreed, without dissent, that the statute enlarges the equity rule, and that it does so is apparent from the language of the statute itself, but even under the equity rule the decree was conclusive upon all claims not excluded from the controversy. Freeman Judg., section 248. Our statute does not confine the question to one of ownership, but it embraces all claims affecting the owner’s right to enjoy his land, for it provides that the action may be brought against any one “ who claims title to or interest in real property.” R. S. 1881, section 1070. It must result from this, as has been often held, that one who is brought into court to answer as to his interest, must set forth all the interest he then claims, and if he fails to do so his
The case before us is quite as strong as one could well be, for here the complaint averred that the appellee was the owner in fee simple and that the claim of the appellant was unjust and unfounded, and so the court expressly finds and decrees. This decree, therefore, adjudges that the whole interest is absolutely in the appellee, and that the claim of the appellant is utterly groundless. A decree adjudging the whole title to be in the plaintiff, and that the defendant's claim is unjust and unfounded, necessarily settles the whole controversy and covers the title and its incidents. This would, indeed, be the effect of the decree if it did no more than adjudge the fee to be in the plaintiff, for he who owns the absolute fee has an unclouded and unburdened estate. As said in Dumont v. Dufore, supra: “A title in fee simple means a title to the whole of the thing absolutely.” This statement of the law has been quoted with approval. Stockton v. Lockwood, 82 Ind. 158; Arnold, v. Smith, 80 Ind. 417.
It is no doubt true that a defendant may have his interest, whatever it may be, protected in a decree; but if the decree contains no limiting clause, and adjudges his claim to be unjust and unfounded, and that of the plaintiff to be in fee simple, it conclusively affirms that he has no claim to the property. Stumph v. Reger, supra. It cuts off every claim,
It is a general principle, pervading every phase of the law' of estoppel, that it must be mutual. Exceptions there may be, but this is the general rule. This principle effectually disposes of the appellant’s contention that the appellee is es-topped by the application made for an assessment of damages to insist upon the decree quieting his title. Had the appellant paid the damages assessed, then, doubtless, the acceptance of the amount would have estopped the appellee. This it refused to do, and successfully resisted the claim of the appellee, by securing a reversal of the judgment awarding him damages. Indiana, etc., R. W. Co. v. Allen, 100 Ind. 409. Having repudiated the claim for damages, the appellant is in no situation to insist that the appellee shall be estopped from asserting his rights under the decree. There is no equity in appellant’s position, for it ought to pay for the land seized without right, or else yield it to the owner. Having been offered an opportunity to pay for it, there is little of justice in its present position that, notwithstanding the decree quieting title in the appellee and pronouncing its own claim unjust and unfounded, all that can be required.of it is to pay damages.
What was said in Glover v. Benjamin, 73 Ill. 42, is not without force here : “ He,” the appellant, “ protested against the action of the court, and caused a reversal of the decree for the reason that he desired no relief or protection. It is
Judgment affirmed.