121 Wis. 558 | Wis. | 1904
This is an action in equity to enjoin the - commission of repeated and continuous threatened trespasses upon real estate. A general demurrer to the complaint having been overruled, the defendant appeals. The complaint r alleges that the plaintiff owns, occupies, and has record title to, certain lots in the city of La Crosse, and has occupied the same for many years as a homestead; also that plaintiff oc- . cupies, and, by adverse possession for more than twenty years, has title to, a certain described strip of land between -said lots and Ninth street in said city, which constitutes a
The simple question presented is whether the complaint states a cause of action in equity, or, in other words, whether it appears therefrom that there is an adequate remedy at law. The principle that a court of equity will not interfere to prevent a mere threatened trespass upon real estate is very ancient and well understood. The idea is that such a wrong is merely temporary in its nature, and, under all ordinary circumstances, may be fully recompensed by an award of damages ; hence that the legal action affords perfect and adequate relief. "While this rule is still in force, the tendency of recent decisions is to enlarge, rather than to narrow, the class •of cases in which a court of equity will interfere to prevent threatened trespass. Not only will it act where the threatened trespass will work irreparable injury to the property itself, amounting essentially to destruction thereof, but also where, by reason of the continuous or repeated character of the threatened invasion, many actions at law would be necessary to be brought, in no one of which could compensation for the whole wrong be obtained. In such cases the legal remedy is held to be inadequate. It is simply an application •of the very old principle that equity will interfere to prevent -a multiplicity of actions at law. 3' Pomeroy, Eq.' Jur.
Had the defendant desired to try the question of the title to the land in question before a jury in an action at law, he could have commenced his action of ejectment and obtained his desire. He can hardly complain of the act of the plaintiff in bringing him into a court of equity, when he attempted to take the law into his own hands.
By the Court. — Order affirmed.