110 N.Y. 336 | NY | 1888
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[EDITORS' NOTE: THIS PAGE CONTAINS HEADNOTES. HEADNOTES ARE NOT AN OFFICIAL PRODUCT OF THE COURT, THEREFORE THEY ARE NOT DISPLAYED.] *344 This action was brought to recover damages for a forcible detainer of two salt blocks, identified in the evidence as numbers 22 and 23. The plaintiff had a verdict, which the General Term has reversed. On the trial the court was asked to charge that there was no evidence of a forcible detainer of block 23. The request was refused and an exception taken to the refusal, and it is upon that exception that the appellate court, so far as its opinion indicates, founded its order for a new trial. We are not contented with that decision. The argument at the bar, and a deliberate study of the proofs, have brought us to a contrary conclusion.
The two blocks were about thirty feet apart, but within the *345 same inclosure. They were held in a common ownership, though by separate leases from the state. They had been used and operated together, but could be utilized separately, and had no necessary connection. Both were out of repair and required preparation and expenditure to put them in condition for use, block 23 being much the most dilapidated and in need of the most extensive repairs. The owners of the two blocks were the plaintiff and his brother, who was a lunatic and in charge of a committee of his person and estate. The Syracuse Fine Salt Company was a corporation duly organized, the ultimate purpose of which was to control the salt manufacture of the entire reservation. This was planned to be effected by leasing all the salt blocks, and operating them under one management, and so controlling the supply and preventing variation or diminution of prices. The success of the project depended upon the ability to bring all the salt blocks into the combination, and so master the market. In carrying out the plan a difficulty was encountered as to blocks 22 and 23. The plaintiff had executed a lease, but hesitated to deliver it, and placed it in escrow in the hands of an officer of the company, and to become operative only upon condition. The committee of the lunatic, without authority of the court, had executed a lease for ten years, but possession of the blocks had not been given and was withheld. In this emergency, the Fine Salt Company passed a resolution directing the defendant to take possession of blocks 22 and 23. The evidence shows that this was the only resolution of the kind passed by the corporation, and indicates the knowledge of its members that there was a difficulty to be overcome, and their determination to get possession, at all hazards, and defend it as best they could. Under this resolution the defendant acted. He so testifies. The direction was to take possession of both blocks, and what he did was adequate for that purpose and effected that precise result. He went to the inclosure and entered it. He carried with him the means of forcing the lock which he expected to encounter, and a new lock to supply its place and give him control. He *346 removed plaintiff's lock and put on his own. Thereafter he met Pharis at block 22, and the violence and personal struggle for possession and control, which both sides detail with but few and unimportant differences, occurred. That violence was aimed at the possession of both blocks, and secured the possession of both. The defendant testified: "It was in my mind to take possession of the blocks." Speaking of his men, he added: "I went there to see that they took and kept possession of the blocks." He told Pharis that he was not able to cope with him or the salt company "in holding on to that property." He said: "If these blocks hadn't come in there would have been no company; the company wouldn't have run if they hadn't been in." At the commencement of the personal struggle he notified the plaintiff, according to the latter's statement, that "he took possession of that block and block 23." While it is true that the violence occurred on block 22, and more than mere words are needed to make a forcible detainer, yet, where the violence was aimed at the possession of both blocks, and was employed to effect that possession, and did in the end secure it, the jury were warranted in finding a forcible detainer of the whole property within the inclosure, and it was no error that the court refused to charge the contrary.
But the reversal by the General Term is now defended upon the ground that the lease from the committee of the lunatic was valid, so far, at least, as to justify the entry of the defendant and repel the charge of a forcible detainer. It is conceded that the committee had no right to lease the interest of the lunatic by virtue of any order of the court, but it is asserted that such right existed where the term was not longer than five years, by force of the common law and the statute, and, while this lease was for ten years, it was, nevertheless, good as a lease from year to year and justified the possession taken. I am not satisfied that the committee of a lunatic ever had the common-law right which is asserted. A survey of the earlier authorities cited quite fully upon the briefs of both parties, has led me to the conclusion that the committee of a lunatic *347
has no title to or interest in the latter's real estate; that he becomes its mere custodian or bailiff, and is such solely as the agent or representative of the court; and has no independent power to dispose of the real estate in any manner whatever. In substance, that, at least, is the doctrine of this court. In theMatter of the Application of Otis (
If we take the average valuation, the two per cent payable, was $60 for each block; and, since the lessors, out of this, were to pay their own taxes and insurance, if they had any, and take their property back with the wear and dilapidation of a season's use, it is evident that the fixed rent was merely nominal, and not the real consideration of the contract. And so there was further stipulated what was denominated a contingent rent. From the earnings of the salt company all expenses of the business were to be deducted, including the two per cent of fixed rental and interest on money borrowed by the corporation for the purposes of its business, and from the balance was to be first deducted ten per cent upon the company's capital paid in or secured. If anything then remained it was to be divided among the block owners to the limit of eight per cent upon their respective valuations. If any surplus still remained, it was to be dividedpro rata between capital and valuations. It is thus apparent that, under the form of a lease, the committee of the lunatic assumed to put the latter's property in the complete control of a corporation, subject to its business success or failure, so far as compensation was concerned, reserving, in the main, no real rent, and even the nominal rent to be fixed by others, and contracting solely for speculative results. Whatever may be said as to an independent power of a committee to make an ordinary and customary lease for a short term, I have no doubt that a contract, like the one before us, running for ten years, tying up the lunatic's estate to the fortune of an untried experiment, never was, either at common law or under the statute, within the authority of a committee acting independently of the court. It was a lease only technically and in form. Substantially, it was a transfer of the blocks for the period named upon a consideration speculative, contingent and doubtful, and making the estate a partner in a corporate enterprise, so far, *350 at least, as its possible profits were concerned, and periling its rental value upon the fortunes of the enterprise. The court itself might well have hesitated, had its authority been sought; but no technical argument, founded upon the form of a lease, can bring this most unusual and extraordinary contract within the independent authority of a committee. If, by possibility, the length of the term could be rejected, there would still remain the inherent character of the contract beyond the committee's authority.
A further effort to sustain the reversal of the General Term was founded upon the partition proceeding instituted by the plaintiff. The judgment in that action was not pleaded as a bar to this, nor were the parties the same. Neither the present defendant nor the salt company were parties when it was rendered, and they were in no manner bound by it. As evidence of possession by plaintiff during the alleged detainer, his complaint was admissible, but the salt company's answer alleged possession by it, and the question became one of fact upon all the evidence in the case.
Some other questions have been examined, but without enabling us to sustain the reversal.
The order of the General Term should be reversed, and that of the Circuit affirmed, with costs.
All concur, except RUGER, Ch. J., not sitting.
Order reversed and judgment affirmed. *351