Idaho-Western Railway Co. v. Columbia Conference of Evangelical Lutheran Augustana Synod

119 P. 60, 20 Idaho 568, 1911 Ida. LEXIS 125
CourtIdaho Supreme Court
DecidedNovember 13, 1911
StatusPublished
Cited by49 cases

This text of 119 P. 60 (Idaho-Western Railway Co. v. Columbia Conference of Evangelical Lutheran Augustana Synod) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Idaho Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Idaho-Western Railway Co. v. Columbia Conference of Evangelical Lutheran Augustana Synod, 119 P. 60, 20 Idaho 568, 1911 Ida. LEXIS 125 (Idaho 1911).

Opinion

AILSHIE, J.

This action was brought by the appellant to condemn a strip of land 100 feet in width along the southwest side of the premises belonging to the respondent corporation and which is occupied by it for college purposes. The respondent is maintaining and conducting what is known as the Coeur d’Alene College in. the suburbs of Coeur d’Alene City, and the lands sought to be condemned are a part of the college campus. On the filing of the complaint notice was issued and served, and thereupon the court appointed commissioners to assess the damages. The commissioners met and [574]*574heard the proofs and made and filed their report. The majority of the commissioners found that the value of the land to be taken was $3,000 and that the damage that would be caused to the remainder of the land by reason of the severance and taking of the part condemned would be $2,000. The college corporation declined to accept the amount allowed by the board, and the case was thereafter tried in the district court, and the jury returned a verdict for the sum of $5,000 as the value of the property to be taken and $3,900 as the amount of damages that would be sustained to the remainder of the property by reason of the severance, and $100 for fences and cattle-guards. Judgment was thereupon entered and this appeal has. been prosecuted by the condemnor.

The only issue that was tried in the district court was the question as to the amount of damages which the college eorporation would sustain by reason of the taking and the severance of the land condemned from the remainder of the tract. The appellant has assigned ninety and nine errors, and inferentially concedes that the court was correct in the balance of his rulings. We shall not be able to take up these assignments of error in detail and consider or discuss them all in a written opinion. We have examined them in detail, however, and will consider the most prominent and important ones and will treat in this opinion such assignments as seem to merit consideration in a written opinion.

The chief complaint made by appellant is against various rulings of the trial court in permitting the president of the college, Doctor Jesperson, to testify concerning the investigation that was made by the committee before determining to acquire this particular tract for college purposes and to give his opinion as to the needs of a college campus and the effect upon the value of the college property that the appearance of the campus has, and to describe the college and tell of its condition and the state of its growth and the increase in students, and to also testify as to depreciation in the value of the property for college purposes if the land sought to be condemned be taken and used for railroad purposes; and that if the use which the condemnor intended to make of the prop[575]*575erty should render it necessary for the college corporation to sell its property in order to purchase and locate somewhere else, the buildings and improvements placed upon the land, aggregating about $40,000, would only sell for a very small percentage of the cost price for any other use or purpose than college purposes. Doctor Jesperson was also allowed to testify to the damaging and detrimental effect upon the college work that would result from the noise of locomotives and trains passing back and forth over this ground so near to the college buildings. Other witnesses were allowed to testify along the same lines and to the same effect. Teachers, instructors and college professors were called and testified along the same general lines, and the music teacher was allowed to testify as to the effect that noise of trains and locomotives so near would have upon the giving of musical instruction in the college and the conducting of that line of college work.

The greater number of the errors assigned on this appeal go to the admission of evidence of the character and to the general effect above mentioned. We are now called upon to determine whether or not this class of evidence was admissible on behalf of respondent or prejudicial to the appellant.

In the first place, appellant urges that the witnesses who were called on behalf of respondent to testify as to the value of the property to be taken and the damage that would be sustained were not qualified and competent to testify upon the subject of value. We do not consider that the objection is well taken. The appellant had the privilege of cross-examining these witnesses, which it exercised to the full extent, and this examination disclosed the extent of the knowledge and information that the several witnesses had on the subject of values and the reasons which led them to make the estimates they did. The jury was competent, and indeed that was its province, to determine the weight to be given the evidence of the several witnesses on this subject. Evidence of value and damages in such cases as this should not be limited or confined to so-called expert witnesses; indeed, it could not be, for the reason that it would be practically impossible to tell just what would constitute an expert in such matters. A [576]*576witness must necessarily claim to know something about the value of such property before he can fix any value, and the extent and value of that knowledge will be fully disclosed on cross-examination. The jury are well qualified to determine the weight to be given the evidence of the several witnesses after they have been cross-examined as to their means of knowledge and the sources of their information upon which they base their estimates. (2 Lewis on Eminent Domain, sec. 654; sec. 435, original edition.)

It is argued by appellant that the only line of evidence that was admissible was such as would show the market value of the property to be taken, and that any other evidence as to special uses to which the owner desired to put the property or to which it might be adaptable was improper and inadmissible. In Portneuf-Marsh etc. Co. v. Portneuf Irrigating Co., 19 Ida. 483, 114 Pac. 19, this court in determining the rule for the assessment of damages in such cases quoted with approval the following extract from Lewis on Eminent Domain, vol. 2, 3d ed., sec. 706:

‘ ‘ In estimating the value of property taken for public use, it is the market value of the property which is to be considered. The market value of property is the price which it will bring when it is offered for sale by one who desires but is not obliged to sell it, and is bought by one who is under no necessity of having it. ' In estimating its value all the capabilities of the property and all the uses to which it' may be applied or for which it is adapted are to be considered, and not merely the condition it is in at the time and the use to which it is then applied by the owner. It is not a question of the value of the property to the owner. Nor ean the damages be enhanced by his unwillingness to sell or because of any sentiment which he has for the property. On the other hand, the damages cannot be measured by the value of the property to the party condemning it, nor by its need of the particular property.”

Following that quotation, this court said:

“It is often difficult to determine the market value of property, for the reason that there may be no general demand for the same, or it may be that the property is only valuable for [577]

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Bluebook (online)
119 P. 60, 20 Idaho 568, 1911 Ida. LEXIS 125, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/idaho-western-railway-co-v-columbia-conference-of-evangelical-lutheran-idaho-1911.