Cooper v. McCormick

69 P. 301, 10 Wyo. 379, 1902 Wyo. LEXIS 18
Wyoming Supreme Court·Decided June 25, 1902·Published·Cited by 16 cases

Opinion

Potter, Chiee Justice.

In this case we are called upon to review the action of the District Court of Carbon County in affirming a decision of the State Board of Land Commissioners ordering that a lease of certain school lands be issued to the defendant in error, and refusing to renew the lease of plaintiff in error for said lands. Upon an appeal from the determination of the state board to the District Court, that court affirmed the acton of the board, and-Frank Cooper, the appellant, brings the matter here on error.

The lands affected are located in Carbon County, and described as section 16, in township 19 north, range 78 west. Cooper held a lease of the land, from the State, dated January 17, 1896, and running for the period of five years from January 10. That lease, therefore, expired by limitation January 10, 1901. An application to again lease the same lands was filed with the board by Cooper December 1, 1900, and was accompanied by the affidavit required by the board showing certain particulars concerning the land, its character, the improvements thereon, and an opinion as to its value for rental purposes.

January 15, 1901, John W. McCormick, the defendant in error, also filed a petition applying for a lease of the lands, which was accompanied by his own affidavit. Upon the filing of this petition, it appears, from the records of the board, that on the same date it was considered in connection with Cooper’s application, and it was ordered that both applicants be called upon to file sealed bids for the leasing of the land. In obedience to an order upon the parties to appear at a stated time and offer whatever evidence they desired, the parties appeared at-the time fixed, and testimony was introduced on behalf of the Cooper application. Cooper at the same time applied for leave to amend his petition bv [396] stating therein that it was for a- renewal of the original lease, and that it was based upon the fact that about two hundred acres of the land had been fully irrigated and reclaimed by the lessee before the expiration of his former lease, and that he had constructed suitable ditches and obtained a permanent water right for the full and complete reclamation of the land. On the same date McCormick’s sealed bid filed by him was opened, and it was found that he had placed a value of three dollars per acre on the section, making the annual rental $96. In the application of Cooper the value was placed at $1.25 per acre.

May 11, 1901, the board rendered its decison, and, in addition to the facts already stated, found the following: That said section was leased to Marsh and Cooper — Cooper being the present applicant — in 1891 upon a valuation of $2.50 per acre (that said parties had monopolized the use of said land for nine years prior thereto without paying rent therefor) ; that in 1895 said land was leased to Frank Cooper upon a valuation of $1.25 per acre, made upon the affidavits of F. O. Harrison, as attorney in fact for Cooper, and one E. Percy Palmer; and that the same was a fraud upon the board; that Cooper is a foreigner residing in England, and has never been a resident of Wyoming; that he had failed and refused to present a sealed bid, as ordered by the board; that his application was not based upon any claim of right, as appears on its face; that the claim of right made at the hearing is not such a claim as would give him a right to renewal under Section 815, Rev. Stat., for the reason, first, no valid claim was made under the statute in the application ; second, fraud was practiced on the board in the statement of the value of the land made in the application, and, third, the testimony showed that Cooper had not complied with the requirements of Section 815 in irrigating forty acres in each and “every one hundred and sixty acres of said land,” nor had he “provided suitable ditches for its full and complete reclamation.”

Thereupon the application and bid of McCormick was [397] accepted and a lease ordered issued to him upon satisfactory-proof of his compliance with the requirements of Section 817, Revised Statutes, which required a lessee to pay or tender to the owner of improvements on the land the value thereof. The application of Cooper was rejected. The reasons for the action thus taken are written in the records of the board as follows:

“No right, under the provisions of Section 815, Revised Statutes, having been established by Cooper. Fraud having, been practiced by Cooper in his representations as to the rental value of the land in his application. Cooper being a citizen of a foreign country. (Chap. 71, Ses. Taws 1901.) Cooper refusing to bid, as required by the order of the board. And it appearing to the board that it will inure to the greatest benefit and secure the greatest revenue to the State.”

In the District Court the matter was heard upon the original papers and affidavits, and the evidence adduced before the board. The fact, if it be a fact, that Marsh and Cooper had occupied or monopolized the premises for several years prior to the lease issued to them in 1891, is not decisive of the controversy, and can have no substantial effect upon the respective right of the parties from a legal standpoint. It is not now urged as a valid objection to the renewal of Cooper’s lease; and we apprehend that it was mentioned among the reasons for the action of the board, more by way of moral support of the conclusion reached than as constituting a legal ground therefor. It is not perceived how the fact can have the effect to deprive Cooper of the right claimed after he had leased the land and paid rental therefor under two separate leases of five years each, he having been associated with Marsh in the first lease. Trespass upon state land, by its occupation without lease or certificate of purchase, is made punishable by fine. (R. S., Sec. 838.) But'the statute does-not impose as’a penalty the forfeiture of any right to take a lease of the premises. It is to be said, moreover, that neither the evidence nor the records [398] of the board before.us, outside the findings, show the occupation of the land by said parties for nine years anterior to the lease of 1891, further than the showing in the testimony of the State Engineer that one of the Cooper ditches car1 ried an appropriation of water as made in 1882, and another an appropriation dating from the spring of 1889.

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Cooper v. McCormick, 69 P. 301, 10 Wyo. 379, 1902 Wyo. LEXIS 18 (Wyo. 1902).

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