Lamson v. Coulson

234 Mass. 288
CourtMassachusetts Supreme Judicial Court
DecidedJanuary 5, 1920
StatusPublished
Cited by10 cases

This text of 234 Mass. 288 (Lamson v. Coulson) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Lamson v. Coulson, 234 Mass. 288 (Mass. 1920).

Opinion

Rugg, C. J.

This is a petition brought under R. L. c. 128, § 105, for the registration of an adverse claim against registered land. The claim is that the registered land is subject to a right of renewal of a lease for a term of years, and that request for renewal has been made according to the terms of the lease and that renewal has not been furnished.

The petitioner is seeking the establishment, and not the en[292]*292forqement, of his claim to a right of renewal of the lease. The real question at issue is whether the right to renewal exists. If it does exist and demand for renewal has been made and refused, that constitutes an incumbrance on the title of the respondents. A claim of this character can be adjudicated under the jurisdiction conferred by the statute. Cunningham v. Bright, 228 Mass. 385. It does not fall within the inhibition of the principle illustrated by Sederquist v. Brown, 225 Mass. 217.

One of the respondents concededly is the owner of the fee of one part, and the other respondent of the remaining part, of the land, to a renewal of a lease of which the petitioner lays claim.

The lease of which the petitioner claims the right of renewal was made by the Commoners of Salisbury to Enoch Stevens by indenture under date of May 1, 1867, and was duly recorded.1 The annual rent reserved was $25. The lease contained this clause: “To Hold for the term of Fifty Years with right of renewal from the First day of May eighteen hundred sixty-eight.” It has not been argued that this lease was not valid and binding upon the lessor and hence upon the respondents as successors in title. It was found by the Land Court to be valid. The facts reported support that conclusion. The presumption is in favor of regularity under the circumstances. Bishop v. Burke, 207 Mass. 133; S. C. 216 Mass. 231. Stauffer v. Koch, 225 Mass. 525.

The lease contained no provision against subletting or assigning.

The leased premises have since become divided into two main parts, the northerly part known under different designations as the Rice lot, as the Ocean View House lot, and as lot numbered 437, and the southerly part known as the Atlantic House lot, as lot numbered 438; and also, after a part had been taken for highway purposes, as lot numbered 438A.

Enoch Stevens, the original lessee, died and in 1868 his widow and son executed a lease to George Hills of the northerly part of the leased premises, being lot No. 437, describing it as bounding southerly “by remaining land leased to said Enoch Stevens by said Commoners” for the term of fifty years from the first day of May, 1868. This contained no provision as to renewal and was strictly a sublease. A year later the executors of the will of Enoch Stevens, the widow and son joining in assent, executed [293]*293to Nelson Kimball an assignment of “the lease from the Commoners of said Salisbury to said Stevens, dated the first of May” 1867 “and all the estate and interest of said Stevens, in and to the premises thereby demised, with the exception thereof, of so much of the described premises in the lease aforesaid, as was leased to George Hills” by the widow and son of Stevens, Kimball to receive the rent reserved therein and to pay the rental to the Commoners. In May, 1872, Kimball assigned to one Morrill the original lease from the Commoners to Stevens except so much as had been subleased to Hills, Morrill to receive the rent from Hills and to pay the rent to the Commoners. On the same day Morrill mortgaged to the same Hills two other parcels of land, “And also one other piece of land, the same being leased land, situated in said Salisbury, and adjoining on the East, the first above described premises, and being the same which said Nelson Kimball, has assigned the lease off, to me, in an assignment, bearing even date and recorded herewith, together with the larger portion of the Hotel building, known as the Atlantic House, at Salisbury Beach, and other buildings standing thereon, and is bounded Northerly by leased land of said Hills; ■ Easterly by the seashore; Southerly by the road leading to said seashore; and Westerly by the first above described premises.” The description of the last tract, contained in the words just quoted, is a description, so far as expressed by metes and bounds, of lot No. 438 alone. It does not describe nor include within its description lot No. 437. So far as concerns description of land, lot No. 437 is excluded because the lot expressly covered by the description “is bounded Northerly by leased land of said Hills,” that is, by the lot No. 437 subleased to Hills in 1868 by the widow and son of Enoch Stevens. On closer analysis of this description it appears clearly to be limited to the southerly lot. The description of the third parcel begins with the words “And also one other piece of land, the same being leased land.” Thus far land and' land alone is described. There is no reference to the lease except to define the nature of the grantor’s title and to show that the land is held under lease and not in fee. Then follow the words, “being the same which said Nelson Kimball, has assigned the lease off, to me.” The word “same” can refer only to the land. It cannot, with due regard to the meaning of words or to grammatical construction, be held [294]*294to refer to the lease or to all the land covered by the lease. The concluding part of the sentence, beginning with the words “and is bounded,” followed by the description by metes and bounds, can have for its subject only the words “one other piece of land” and the various synonyms by which that “piece of land” then to be described is designated. The only land described is the single lot No. 438. Lot No. 437 is by express terms excluded from that description because used as a boundary.

The description of the first tract included within the Morrill mortgage (which confessedly does not include any of the property covered by original lease to Enoch Stevens) confirms the construction that Morrill realized fully that the real property included within the Stevens lease as one parcel had been later subdivided into two parts, because the easterly boundary of that first tract is given in these words: “Easterly by land heretofore leased by the Commoners to Enoch Stevens, deceased, and by the Executors and heirs of said Stevens, assigned to Nelson Kim-ball, in part, and in part to said Hills, and by said Kimball to myself, in an assignment of said lease bearing even date herewith.” These words import recognition of two lots held by different persons as lessees.

The Morrill mortgage was of the same date as the assignment of lease by Kimball to Morrill. The operative words of that instrument are that “I, Nelson Kimball . . . hereby grant, and assign to said Morrill the lease from the Commoners of Salisbury ... to Enoch Stevens,” dated May 1, 1867, “and all the estate and interest that I the said Kimball have in and to the premises thereby demised,” with the exception of that part theretofore leased to George Hills. This was a plain assignment of the entire lease. With this instrument before him and fresh in his mind because he had acquired it that very day, Momll gave the mortgage to Hills with the significantly different words of description heretofore quoted. He nowhere uses words of assignment or conveyance of the lease which he had just purchased. He does the very different thing of describing in the mortgage only one of the two parcels which together made up the land demised by the lease to Stevens.

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Bluebook (online)
234 Mass. 288, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/lamson-v-coulson-mass-1920.