UTAH STREAM ACCESS COALITION, Appellee, v. ORANGE STREET DEVELOPMENT, Appellant, and STATE OF UTAH, by and through its DIVISION OF FORESTRY, FIRE AND STATE LANDS, Appellee.
No. 20150439-SC
SUPREME COURT OF THE STATE OF UTAH
November 22, 2017
2017 UT 82
On Direct Appeal
Third District Court, Silver Summit
No. 110500360
Attorneys:
Michael D. Zimmerman, Troy L. Booher, Erin Bergeson Hull, Christopher E. Bramhall, Salt Lake City, Anthony W. Schofield, Peter C. Schofield, Lehi, for appellant
Sean D. Reyes, Att’y Gen., Stanford E. Purser, Deputy Solic. Gen., Norman K. Johnson, Michael S. Johnson, John Robinson Jr., Asst. Att’ys Gen., Salt Lake City, for appellee State of Utah Division of Forestry, Fire and State Lands
Opinion of the Court
ASSOCIATE CHIEF JUSTICE LEE authored the opinion of the Court, in which CHIEF JUSTICE DURRANT, JUSTICE HIMONAS, and JUDGE CHRISTIANSEN joined.
JUSTICE DURHAM filed an opinion concurring in part and dissenting in part.
Having recused himself, JUSTICE PEARCE does not participate herein; COURT OF APPEALS ASSOCIATE PRESIDING JUDGE MICHELE M. CHRISTIANSEN sat.
ASSOCIATE CHIEF JUSTICE LEE, opinion of the Court:
¶ 1 Our decision in Conatser v. Johnson, 2008 UT 48, 194 P.3d 897, established a public easement right to incidentally touch the beds of Utah waterways for recreational or other lawful purposes. The legislature responded to this decision by enacting the Public Waters Access Act.
¶ 2 This case presents questions concerning the interpretation and application of the Act. The plaintiff is Utah Stream Access Coalition (USAC). USAC filed this suit seeking a declaration that a one-mile stretch of the Weber River is “navigable water” to which the public has a statutory right of recreational use.
¶ 3 The district court ruled in USAC’s favor. It found that the one-mile stretch of the Weber River was “navigable water.” And it accordingly held that USAC had a right of access to the waters in question. We affirm. We hold that the Act invokes a legal term of art embedded in federal law. And we uphold the district court’s conclusion that the stretch of the Weber River in question qualifies as “navigable” under this standard.
I
¶ 4 In 2011, USAC filed this lawsuit against Orange Street and other property owners along a one-mile stretch of the Weber River. USAC initially named the Summit County Sherriff, the Utah Division of Wildlife Resources, and the Division of Parks and Recreation as additional defendants. But the parties agreed to substitute the Utah Division of Forestry, Fire, and State Lands (the State) for these parties. And throughout the litigation, the State took a mostly neutral stance; it did not take a formal position on the questions presented.
¶ 5 USAC asserted that the disputed section of the Weber River is navigable water. And it sought declaratory relief confirming its right to use the river for recreation and an injunction barring property owners and state officials from interfering with its members’ recreational use rights.
¶ 6 During the litigation, the State raised a concern about the scope of the issues before the district court—specifically the title implications of the litigation for property owners along the Weber River. In response to these and other concerns, USAC explained that it sought only recreational use rights for its members and not a title determination. Ultimately, USAC’s trial brief clarified that it rooted its right of access in the Public Waters Access Act, which in its view implicated a navigability standard imported from federal law.
¶ 7 The district court held a four-day bench trial in February 2015. At trial the
¶ 8 The district court also quieted title to the streambed under the one-mile stretch of the Weber River, holding that the State held title in the streambed. But USAC did not assert a quiet title claim—and it even disavowed any interest in pursuing a title determination during the litigation. And all parties on appeal acknowledge that the quiet title decision was error.
¶ 9 We accordingly reverse the district court on this point—vacating the decision to quiet title to the streambed. And because we reverse on the ground that a quiet title claim was not properly presented to the district court, we do not reach the question whether USAC would have standing to seek a title determination in these circumstances.
¶ 10 In so doing we do not take a position on who holds title to the streambed in question, or even on the question whether the State would be precluded from challenging the navigability determination here in any future case in which a title dispute may arise. Thus, we are not holding that Orange Street “still hold[s] title to the land in name only.” Infra ¶ 45. Nor are we deciding that the navigability decision we affirm here is based on “a ‘third category of water courses’” distinct from those discussed herein. Infra ¶ 47. We are simply holding that it was error to award a remedy (a declaration and order expressly quieting title in the State) in the absence of a specific request therefor.
¶ 11 If and when there is a title dispute over the streambed in question, it may well be that the State will be precluded from challenging the navigability determination in this case. But that will depend on the application of the law of claim preclusion or collateral estoppel.1 The parties have not briefed that question here so it would
be premature for us to resolve it. And it was likewise premature for the district court to order a remedy that no party had requested.
II
¶ 12 The Public Waters Access Act states that “[t]he public may use a public water for recreational activity if” it “is a navigable water.”
¶ 14 Orange Street concedes that it failed to preserve its challenge to the legal standard applied by the district court. With that in mind, Orange Street’s first argument is rightly framed in “plain error” terms. See State v. Powell, 2007 UT 9, ¶ 18, 154 P.3d 788. Thus, we consider the legal standard applied by the district court under a plain error standard of review.2 Id. And we find a lack of plain error.
In so concluding we are not saying that Orange Street still holds title, infra ¶ 45, or that the navigability decision we affirm here is insufficient to establish title, infra ¶ 47. We are simply holding that it was error to award a remedy in the absence of a specific request therefor. And we leave the ultimate disposition of this question to future litigation on the matter.
¶ 15 We also affirm the district court’s finding of navigability. The district court’s findings of fact, of course, are reviewed deferentially for clear error. See In re Adoption of Baby B., 2012 UT 35, ¶ 40, 308 P.3d 382. The standard of review for the mixed determination of navigability under the facts of this case is less clear. Id. ¶¶ 42–44 (noting that the standard of review of mixed determinations “is sometimes deferential and sometimes not,” depending on “the nature of the issue and the marginal costs and benefits of a less deferential, more heavy-handed appellate touch”). But we think that finding should be given some deference too, given the fact-intensive nature of the question of navigability. Again, however, we agree with the district court’s analysis, and find that the evidence in the record supports the determination that the stretch of the Weber River in question is navigable under the Act.
A
¶ 16 We agree with Orange Street’s threshold point: the question of “navigability” under the Public Waters Access Act is decidedly a question of state law. The Act includes a statutory definition of navigability. See
¶ 17 We also agree that the district court looked to the federal “navigability for title” standard in its analysis. It cited federal cases in articulating the operative standard of navigability in this case. See The Daniel Ball, 77 U.S. 557, 577 (1870), superseded by statute as stated in Rapanos v. United States, 547 U.S. 715 (2006); PPL Mont., LLC v. Montana, 565 U.S. 576, 592 (2012).
¶ 18 That said, we think the district court’s reliance on federal cases was harmless error. We affirm the district court’s legal standard because we find the statutory standard set forth in the Act to essentially mirror or incorporate the federal standard.
¶ 19 The statute speaks of a “water course” that “is useful for commerce and has a useful capacity as a public highway of transportation.”
federal standard is substantially equivalent. It speaks of waters that “are used, or . . . susceptible of being used, in their ordinary condition, as highways for commerce, over which
¶ 20 The parallelism in terminology is striking. Both the state and federal standards define a concept of “navigability.” The key operative terms of both standards, moreover, are identical. Both speak of waters used as “highways.” And both refer to those “highways” being used for conducting “commerce.”
¶ 21 The legislature’s adoption of longstanding federal terminology is decisive. A “cardinal rule of statutory construction” says that a legislature’s use of an established legal term of art incorporates “the cluster of ideas that were attached to each borrowed word in the body of learning from which it was taken.” FAA v. Cooper, 566 U.S. 284, 292 (2012) (citation omitted).3 And that rule is properly invoked here. The striking parallelism between the statutory definition and the federal standard is an indication that our legislature was adopting the “cluster of ideas” in federal law. We interpret the Public Waters Access Act to incorporate the federal standard of navigability.
¶ 22 Orange Street identifies a purported difference in the terminology of the state and federal standards. It notes that the Utah statute speaks in the present tense—of a water course that “is useful for commerce and has a useful capacity as a public highway of transportation.”
¶ 23 But this is a distinction without a difference. The statute uses the same verb tense as the federal cases. The Daniel Ball case, as quoted above, uses present tense verbs. It speaks of waterways that
“are used”—or even are “susceptible of being used”—as “highways for commerce.” Daniel Ball, 77 U.S. at 563 (emphasis added). And it likewise frames the analysis of the use of such “highways” for “trade and travel” in the present tense—speaking of highways “over which trade and travel are or may be conducted in the customary modes of trade and travel on water.” Id. (emphasis added). In context, however, the timeframe of the inquiry into use of waterways as highways for commerce is understood as backward-looking. See PPL Mont., 565 U.S. at 592. And the present verb tense of the Daniel Ball formulation has always been understood, with that gloss, as backward-looking.
¶ 24 The verb-tense problem in this field stems from a distinction between the “navigability” question presented in Daniel Ball and that at issue in cases involving “navigability for title.” Daniel Ball concerned the scope of Congress’s power over “commerce,” which has long been understood to extend to the regulation of “‘all navigable waters of the United States.’” 77 U.S. at 564 (quoting Gilman v. Philadelphia, 70 U.S. 713, 724–25 (1865)). And in that setting the present tense formulation makes perfect sense—Congress has power to regulate a waterway if it is navigable. The Daniel Ball test has been transplanted consistently to cases involving title under the equal footing doctrine.4 In the navigability-for-title cases the quote from Daniel Ball is preserved, with the present verb tense included. See, e.g., United States v. Utah, 283 U.S. 64, 76 (1931) (quoting Daniel Ball
¶ 25 The standard in the Public Waters Access Act is parallel to that set forth in the federal cases. It invokes the terminology of the federal case law. And because the federal standard is viewed as backward-looking despite its present-tense formulation, we view the Utah Act to contemplate the same timeframe: the question is whether a given water course meets the statutory standard of navigability as of the time of statehood.
¶ 26 A contrary conclusion would be hard to square with the structure of the Act. The statute contemplates two categories of water courses—those that traverse public property and those that traverse private property.6 And it allows recreational use of water courses that traverse public property and cuts off the Conatser v. Johnson, 2008 UT 48, 194 P.3d 897, right of use of water courses that traverse private property.7 Orange Street’s approach contemplates a
new third category of water courses. To accept its view we would have to interpret the statute to establish public use rights for a subset of water courses that traverse private property but are open to recreation without a showing of adverse possession. We find no room in the language or structure of the statute to support this approach.
¶ 27 For these reasons we conclude that any error in the district court’s decision to look to federal law was harmless. And because we find no prejudicial error we cannot reverse on the basis of any plain error. Powell, 2007 UT 9, ¶ 21 (“The third element of the plain error analysis requires that the party seeking review show that the error was harmful.”).
B
¶ 28 The district court applied the above-cited standard to the evidence presented at trial. It credited evidence of regular log drives to supply the railroad, transportation of mining timbers, and the delivery of logs to sawmills at the relevant time of statehood. It also found that this commercial activity could not feasibly have taken place but for the Weber River, as there were no commercially viable overland means of transporting the timber from the forest to its destination. And on these grounds it concluded that this
¶ 29 These findings are more than sufficient to sustain the district court’s determination of navigability. As the text of the statutory definition indicates, the touchstone of navigability is commercial utility—whether a waterway is “useful for commerce” or in other words has “useful capacity as a public highway of transportation.”
To meet the test of navigability as understood in the American law a water course should be susceptible of use for purposes of commerce or possess a capacity for valuable floatage in the transportation to market of the products of the country through which it runs. It should be of practical usefulness to the public as a public highway in its natural state and without the aid of artificial means. A theoretical or potential navigability, or one that is temporary, precarious, and unprofitable, is not sufficient.
Monroe v. State, 175 P.2d 759, 761 (Utah 1946) (quoting Harrison v. Fite, 148 F. 781, 783–84 (8th Cir. 1906)).
¶ 30 The nature of commercial utility may vary from region to region. “It is obvious that the uses to which the streams may be put vary from the carriage of ocean liners to the floating out of logs.” United States v. Appalachian Elec. Power Co., 311 U.S. 377, 405 (1940) (citation omitted), superseded by statute as stated in Rapanos v. United States, 547 U.S. 715 (2006). “[T]he density of traffic varies equally widely from the busy harbors of the seacoast to the sparsely settled regions of the Western mountains.” Id. at 405–06 (citation omitted). And “[t]he tests as to navigability must take these variations into consideration.” Id. at 406.8
¶ 31 The evidence credited by the district court is easily sufficient under this legal framework. The controlling question is commercial utility—proof that the waterway in question is “generally and commonly useful to some purpose of trade or agriculture.” United States v. Rio Grande Dam & Irrigation Co., 174 U.S. 690, 699 (1899) (citation omitted). And the log drive evidence in the record can adequately establish commercial utility. Log drives are a relevant “purpose of trade or agriculture,” and the evidence in the record sustained both the general nature and commonality of such use.
¶ 32 This analysis also forecloses Orange Street’s various attempts to undermine the district court’s determination of navigability. First, the operative navigability test does not require proof of both commercial “trade” and passenger “travel.” Daniel Ball, granted, uses the phrase “trade and travel.” 77 U.S. at 563. It is also true that the U.S. Supreme Court decisions upholding the navigability of a waterway have cited evidence of both commercial use and passenger travel. See, e.g., United States v. Holt State Bank, 270 U.S. 49, 57 (1926) (noting that early settlers used the water course as a “route[] for trade and travel”). But that does not render such dual evidence necessary. And we find no such requirement in the operative legal standard. The essential
¶ 33 That conclusion also overtakes Orange Street’s second (and related) point—that the log drive evidence in the record failed because it was limited to periods of seasonal runoff, and was not year-round. As Orange Street indicates, “[t]he mere fact that logs, poles, and rafts are floated down a stream occasionally and in times of high water does not make it a navigable river.” Rio Grande Dam, 174 U.S. at 698.10 But the evidence here was not of mere occasional commercial use. It was of regular, common use of the Weber River for log drives. And because that evidence demonstrated the commercial utility of the river it also established its navigability.
¶ 34 Orange Street cites Oklahoma v. Texas, 258 U.S. 574 (1922), in support of its assertion that the Weber River is non-navigable because “[i]ts characteristics are such that its use for transportation [are] . . . confined to the irregular and short periods of temporary high water.” Id. at 591. But again that is not the state of the record here. The evidence showed that the Weber River was used—not irregularly during rare periods of high water—but regularly and commonly for commercially viable log drives. And again that is sufficient. Where the “navigable quality of a water course . . . continue[s] long enough to be useful and valuable in transportation; and the fluctuations . . . come regularly with the seasons, so that the period of navigability may be depended upon,” the water course will satisfy the navigability test even if navigable conditions are not continuous. Monroe, 175 P.2d at 761.11 That standard was satisfied by the evidence in the record here.
¶ 35 We affirm on that basis. We conclude that there was sufficient evidence to support the district court’s determination that the relevant stretch of the Weber River was commercially useful on a regular basis, and not merely in an occasional season of high water. And we deem that evidence sufficient to establish navigability of the river where it crosses the property at issue in this case.
III
¶ 36 For the reasons set forth above, we affirm the district court’s determination that the disputed segment of the Weber River is navigable water under the Public Waters Access Act. We also vacate the district court’s decision quieting title in the State (in light of the parties’ confession of error on that point).
¶ 37 I concur in most of the majority opinion’s analysis, but disagree with its reversal of the district court’s title determination. The majority opinion reverses the district court’s holding that “quieted title to the streambed under the one-mile stretch of the Weber River, holding that the State held title to the streambed.” Supra ¶ 8. I understand the majority’s hesitance to quiet title in the State when the parties stipulated that they were not seeking to quiet title. However, I believe U.S. Supreme Court precedent mandates that we recognize the State’s title when a waterway is determined to be navigable and I dissent from this portion of the opinion. I would hold that a federal navigability-for-title claim is a quiet title claim. I first discuss why I believe we must hold that the State has title, then why I believe USAC has standing to bring such a claim in this case.
I. TITLE VESTED IN THE STATE AT THE TIME OF STATEHOOD
¶ 38 “Upon statehood, the State gains title within its borders to the beds of waters then navigable . . . .” PPL Mont., LLC v. Montana, 565 U.S. 576, 591 (2012); see also Oregon ex rel. State Land Bd. v. Corvallis Sand & Gravel Co., 429 U.S. 363, 370 (1977) (“[U]nder the equal-footing doctrine new States, upon their admission to the Union, acquire title to the lands underlying navigable waters within their boundaries.”). Thus, if a body of water was navigable at the time of statehood, “[t]he title to the land underlying the . . . [r]iver at the time [the State] was admitted to the Union vested in the State as of that date.” Corvallis Sand & Gravel Co., 429 U.S. at 370; see also PPL Mont., LLC, 565 U.S. at 592 (“For state title under the equal-footing doctrine, navigability is determined at the time of statehood . . . .”). This test, determining the navigability at the time of statehood, is often called the federal navigability-for-title test because it is used to recognize lands that the State took title to when it joined the union. See supra ¶ 24; PPL Mont., LLC, 565 U.S. at 594.
¶ 39 Under this test, if a waterway was navigable at the time of statehood, “the State‘s title to the riverbed vests absolutely as of the time of its admission and is not subject to later defeasance by operation of any doctrine of federal common law;” only “state law governs subsequent dispositions.”12 Corvallis Sand & Gravel Co., 429 U.S. at
370–71, 378 (emphasis added). Indeed, the language from United States Supreme Court precedent makes it clear that the State has always held title to those lands since the State’s birth, regardless of whether a court ever has, or ever does, determine that the waterway is navigable. The State gained title to the land under all navigable waters in 1896. Thus once a district court recognizes that a stretch of river was navigable under the navigability-for-title test, it necessarily recognizes that the State has held title to the land under that section of water since 1896. See PPL Mont., LLC, 565 U.S. at 591 (“The title consequences of the equal-footing doctrine can be stated in summary form: Upon statehood, the State gains title within its borders to the beds of waters then navigable . . . .”).
¶ 40 While the parties, and the plaintiff in particular, generally frame what issues this court determines, see Osguthorpe v. ASC Utah, Inc., 2015 UT 89, ¶ 49, 365 P.3d 1201 (stating that judges are typically “barred from ‘granting [] relief on issues neither raised nor tried’” (alteration in original) (citation omitted)); Caterpillar Inc. v. Williams, 482 U.S. 386, 398–99 (1987) (stating that “the plaintiff is the master of the complaint”), parties do not have the power to argue that a waterway is navigable under the navigability-for-title test without triggering our recognition that title vested in the State in 1896. When a party brings a claim that a waterway is navigable under the federal navigability-for-title test, the nature of the claim itself requires
¶ 41 The majority characterizes the district court’s declaration and order expressly quieting title in the State as a “remedy.” Supra ¶¶ 10–11. However, the quiet title decision is not a separate remedy, but an inescapable legal corollary to a court determination that a waterway was navigable at the time of statehood under the federal navigability-for-title test. A corollary “requir[es] no additional proof following upon one just demonstrated.” Corollary, WEBSTER’S NEW INTERNATIONAL DICTIONARY (2d ed. 1949). It is alternately defined as “[a] deduction, consequence, or additional inference, more or less immediate, from a proved proposition” and “[s]omething that naturally follows; a practical consequence; a result.” Id. For example,
a well-known theorem in Euclidean geometry is the Pythagorean theorem.13 A corollary to this theorem is that if the sides of a triangle can be written in a mathematically correct equation in accordance with the Pythagorean theorem, then it is a right triangle. This statement necessarily follows from proving the Pythagorean theorem. So, if a triangle has sides measuring 3, 4, and 5, and 32 + 42 = 52 (9 + 16 = 25), it is a right triangle: it is an inescapable result of the mathematically correct equation. In this case, if a court determines that the elements of the federal navigability-for-title test (the lengths of the triangle) are met, qualifying as “navigable” under the standard (the equation as written from the Pythagorean theorem is mathematically correct), then the state holds title (the triangle is a right triangle). It is not a separate “remedy,” but a “result” or “practical consequence” that “require[es] no additional proof following upon one just demonstrated.” Id.
¶ 42 Litigation of a navigability-for-title claim necessarily leads to a determination that quiets title. That is because this court does not grant title to the State; the United States Constitution already granted title to the State at the time it was admitted into the union. PPL Mont., LLC, 565 U.S. at 591 (2012) (“[A] State’s title to these lands [is] ‘conferred not by Congress but by the Constitution itself.’” (citation omitted)). In a case such as this, we merely determine whether the waterway was navigable at statehood. At that point, we necessarily recognize that the State has held title to that land since 1896. See, e.g., Mont. Coal. for Stream Access, Inc. v. Curran, 682 P.2d 163, 166 (Mont. 1984) (“Since the Dearborn [River] was navigable under the log-floating test at the time of statehood in 1889, title to the riverbed was owned by the federal government prior to statehood and was transferred to the State of Montana upon admission to the Union.”). No stipulation by the parties can overcome the inevitable result that the State holds title to the land. Even if we remove the portion of the district court’s judgment that quiets title in the State, the State still holds title whether this court recognizes it or not.
¶ 43 Even the State acknowledges this outcome. In its brief, the State “concedes the obvious title implications of the district court’s navigability finding, and does not intend to ignore those implications.” Despite this concession, the State argues that it was inappropriate for the district court to state the obvious and inescapable outcome of such a claim and hold that the State holds title to the lands at issue. It asserts that for a court to quiet title, the State must request as much. This raises some significant and troubling issues. The State is essentially arguing that it enjoys all the benefits of owning the land, as the navigability finding so obviously implies, but that it doesn’t want to actually
¶ 44 I would hold that the State cannot have its cake and eat it too. First, the State cannot, over one-hundred and twenty years after it acquired title under the United States Constitution, decide it does not want title, or does not want its title to be recognized at this time. “[T]he State‘s title to the riverbed vests absolutely as of the time of its admission and is not subject to later defeasance . . . .” Corvallis Sand & Gravel Co., 429 U.S. at 370–71. Additionally, the State has already accepted title to the lands under navigable waterways when it adopted the Utah Constitution. See
¶ 45 Second, the majority’s awkward determination puts landowners in untenable positions. Under the majority’s opinion, Orange Street does not enjoy the rights accorded to private property owners under the Public Waters Access Act. Without title to the State being acknowledged and formally declared, Orange Street would for some purposes still hold title to the land in name only, but not in fact. Orange Street may very well be liable to pay property taxes on that land. This removes at least one incentive for the State to bring a quiet title action. If the State, and its subdivisions, can continue to receive property taxes on the land yet enjoy many of the benefits of public ownership, it may decide to never bring a quiet title action. Then we could have the odd case where the landowner sues the State to force the State to take title to the land.
¶ 46 Additionally, the majority’s analysis recognizes that a navigability-for-title claim is a quiet title claim. The majority opinion includes excellent and detailed analysis on why the Public Waters
Access Act incorporates the federal navigability-for-title test in its definition of navigability. It concludes its analysis by stating that
The [Public Water Access Act] contemplates two categories of water courses—those that traverse public property and those that traverse private property. . . . Orange Street’s [interpretation of the Act] contemplates a new third category of water courses. To accept its view we would have to interpret the statute to establish public use rights for a subset of water courses that traverse private property but are open to recreation without a showing of adverse possession. We find no room in the language or structure of the statute to support this approach.
Supra ¶ 26 (footnotes omitted). I agree wholeheartedly with this statement. When we interpret the Public Waters Access Act to incorporate the federal navigability-for-title test, we are essentially saying that there are only two categories of land over which natural water runs: public land and private land. The public, under the Act, has the right to use the public land under public water, but can only use the private land under public water if the use is incidental to the public’s floating rights or the public proves some sort of public easement or adverse possession under
¶ 47 The majority’s opinion rejects Orange Street’s attempt to create a third category of water courses, holding that it does not comport with the “language or structure of the statute.” Supra ¶ 26. The majority recognizes that “[t]he statute contemplates two categories of water courses—those that traverse public property and those that traverse private property.” Supra ¶ 26. But then, just paragraphs after denouncing such an approach, the majority goes on to create a “third category of water courses”: those that are navigable, but not public property. Supra ¶ 26. Without quieting title to the land in the State, the majority still holds that the public has almost unrestricted rights to use that land, but that the State does not have title. This discrepancy will create confusion as to how such a case should be litigated. According to the majority, the public only has use rights on public land. Thus, its opinion essentially forces private parties to prove that the State holds title to the lands underneath navigable waterways. Yet, the majority then
¶ 48 I agree with the State that we cannot “ignore” the “obvious title implications” that arise when we hold that a body of water is navigable under the federal navigability-for-title test. Because a claim that a river is navigable under the federal navigability-for-title
test is necessarily a claim to quiet title, I would address whether private parties have standing to bring such a claim.
II. PRIVATE PARTIES HAVE STANDING
¶ 49 The majority avoids the question of whether a private party has standing to bring a claim that the State has title to the lands underlying navigable waters. Supra ¶ 9. Because I see a claim for navigability-for-title as being identical to a claim for quiet title, I would reach that issue and hold that Utah citizens, in some circumstances, do have standing.
¶ 50 Traditional standing exists when a person has suffered a “distinct and palpable injury” that gives it a “personal stake” in the outcome of litigation. Utah Chapter of Sierra Club v. Utah Air Quality Bd., 2006 UT 74, ¶ 19, 148 P.3d 960 (citation omitted). To establish such an injury, the party must show 1) that “it has been or will be ‘adversely affected by the [challenged] actions,” 2) “a causal relationship ‘between the injury to the party, the [challenged] actions and the relief requested,’” and 3) that “the relief requested must be ‘substantially likely to redress the injury claimed.’” Id. (alterations in original) (citations omitted). In the context of a claim that seeks to quiet title to land, the party asserting the claim must establish that it “could acquire an interest in the property created by the court’s judgment or decree.” Holladay Towne Ctr., L.L.C. v. Brown Family Holdings, L.L.C., 2011 UT 9, ¶ 54, 248 P.3d 452 (citation omitted). Standing does not exist only for those parties “who [can] acquire [complete] title,” but for those parties that could acquire any interest in the land. Id. Under United States Supreme Court precedent and our constitution, the people of this State hold an interest in the lands held by the State under the public trust doctrine, including land under navigable waters.
¶ 51 When Utah was admitted into the union, the title to the lands underlying navigable waters passed to the State. See Mont. Coal. for Stream Access, Inc. v. Curran, 682 P.2d 163, 166 (Mont. 1984) (“[T]itle to the riverbed [of navigable rivers] was owned by the federal government prior to statehood and was transferred to the State . . . upon admission to the Union.”). However, the State is not the only party to hold an interest in the land. According to
¶ 52 Article XX, section 1 thus creates something akin to a traditional trust relationship, with the State acting as trustee and the people as beneficiaries. In the traditional trust relationship, the beneficiaries hold equitable title to (or an equitable interest in) the trust estate, and the trustee typically holds legal title. In re Estate of Flake, 2003 UT 17, ¶ 11, 71 P.3d 589 (“The nature of [a trust] is such that the legal title of the property is held by the trustee, but the benefit and enjoyment of the property resides with the beneficiaries.”) superseded by statute on other grounds as recognized in Dahl v. Dahl, 2015 UT 79, ¶ 32, --- P.3d ---; RESTATEMENT (THIRD) OF TRUSTS § 2 cmt. d (AM. LAW INST., 2003) (“Although trust beneficiaries have equitable title, a trustee‘s title to trust property may be either legal or equitable. Although it is usually true . . . that the trustee has legal title, in some instances the trustee will hold only an equitable title.”). Thus, the people of Utah, including the members of USAC, could obtain an interest in the lands at issue in this case if we hold that the waters are navigable.
¶ 53 While this may be the case, I would not hold that every citizen has standing to
¶ 54 Here, the members of USAC are citizens of Utah. Thus, once USAC establishes that the one-mile section of the Weber River is navigable, its members gain an equitable property interest in the lands underneath those waters. Additionally, its members were injured by the defendants’ actions in restricting access to those waters. USAC’s members frequently fished and waded through the stretch of the river at issue here. Once the Public Waters Access Act was passed, Orange Street and other defendants posted no trespassing signs, cutting off USAC’s members’ rights to wade in the river. A decree that the State owns the beds of those waters, and thereby holds them in trust for the people, would grant access to USAC and its members, thereby remedying their particularized harm. See
¶ 55 I understand the majority’s hesitance in reaching this issue. I would also hesitate to grant an unrestricted right to private parties to litigate a claim that forces the State to take title, but I think fears in that regard are unfounded because the State would almost certainly be a necessary and indispensable party in any such claim. See
¶ 56 I would hold that USAC has standing to bring a claim to quiet title to the lands at issue in this case in the State and the people of Utah. Accordingly, I would affirm the district court and hold that the State gained title to the land in 1896.
Notes
A decision on the availability of this remedy may require more than a mere showing of the logical equivalence of the “navigability” question at issue here and that necessary for quieting title. A key question, for example, is whether the State is bound by the navigability determination made here under the law of issue preclusion. And because the parties stipulated that they were not seeking a quiet title determination and the State was at least arguably not a party to the proceedings, we conclude that it was error for the court to make a quiet title determination. (Continued)