Northern Indiana Land Co. v. Carlin

127 N.E. 197, 189 Ind. 324, 1920 Ind. LEXIS 27
CourtIndiana Supreme Court
DecidedApril 29, 1920
DocketNo. 23,558
StatusPublished
Cited by3 cases

This text of 127 N.E. 197 (Northern Indiana Land Co. v. Carlin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Indiana Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Northern Indiana Land Co. v. Carlin, 127 N.E. 197, 189 Ind. 324, 1920 Ind. LEXIS 27 (Ind. 1920).

Opinion

Myers, J.

Patrick J. Carlin and six other persons,

five of whom are appellees herein, on January 24, 1916, filed in the clerk’s office of the Lake Circuit Court their petition for the establishment of a drain and laterals thereto in Lake county, Indiana, pursuant to the Drainage Act of 1907, Acts 1907 p. 508, §6140 et seq. Burns 1914. This proposed drain was known as Singleton ditch No. 3.

[327]*327At the time of filing this petition there was pending in the same court the petition of Charles A. Buckley and fourteen other persons for the establishment of a drain to be known as Cries el ditch No. 3, and one lateral thereto.

On March 6, 1917, oh order of court, the Cries el ditch petition and the Singleton ditch petition were consolidated, the former to stand as a supplemental petition to the latter. Drainage commissioners were appointed and such proceedings were thereafter had, including reports by the commissioners, which were judicially declared not according to law, that on February 18, 1918, the commissioners filed their last amended report, to which report remonstrances were filed. The issues formed by the petitions, commissioners ’ report, and remonstrances were submitted to the court, trial was had, special finding of facts made, and conclusion of law stated thereon. The judgment of the court was “that the ditch petitioned for and as reported by the commissioners be established as reported and the assessments as reported by the commissioners and as modified by the court are in all things confirmed.”

The drainage commissioners reported that they designated as the main ditch, known as Singleton ditch No. 3, one extension referred to as section A, and thirty laterals or branch drains, affecting in the aggregate several'thousand acres of land, and involving the descriptions of numerous parcels of land less than forty-acre tracts. This report together with the report of the engineer cover 115 typewritten pages of the record. The remonstrators challenged the report as not being according to law, and by proper [328]*328assignments of error in this court they attack the judgment of the lower court on the ground that it was without jurisdiction to establish the proposed ditch and laterals thereto, and because of erroneous conclusions of law.

1. The contentions of • appellants, hereafter in this opinion noticed, challenge the foundation upon which the judgment in this case rests. ' For it must be conceded that the petition, and the law thereby invoked concerning drainage liberally Construed to effectuate the purpose intended, fur.nishes the rule by which these proceedings must be measured, and the questions presented must be answered. We are only concerned with the issues tendered by the remonstrances filed to the final amended report of the drainage commissioners. However, at this point we find that appellees, in effect, are insisting that the'judgment herein should be affirmed on the theory that all reasonable presumptions must be indulged in favor of the proceedings and action of the trial court, and in support of this insistence they point to the record, which shows that each of the appellants filed a remonstrance to each report ,and neither of these remonstrances, except the last, is here as a part of the record. They cite Wiley v. Peckinpaugh (1912), 178 Ind. 618, 99 N. E. 807. In that case it is held that parties to the proceeding, at the time the first report of the drainage commissioners- is filed, who fail to remonstrate will not be permitted to file a remonstrance to a new or subsequent report, except as to new matter in the latter, report, and that parties brought in by the new report may remonstrate for any cause regardless of the matter con[329]*329tained in the first report. The facts in the Wiley' case distinguish it from the case at bar.

2. It is the duty of an appellant on appeal to this court to present a record showing the error relied upon, or one that will fully present the questions he desires to have considered. Price v. Huddleston (1906), 167 Ind. 536, 79 N. E. 496. That has been done with sufficient certainty in this case. If a more complete record might have rendered harmless the claimed erroneous action of the trial court, as is suggested by appellees, and they desired to make such point, they should have exercised their right to a writ of certiorari and brought such omitted proceedings into the record. “Council was under a duty to examine the transcript, and the fault is theirs if they do not take steps necessary to rectify errors and secure amendments.” Elliott, App. Proc. §217; Gregory v. Slaughter (1862), 19 Ind. 342; Price v. Huddleston, supra.

• As we read the record in this case, we conclude that the only real controversy here presented hinges.on the legal effect of the facts relative to proposed extension A and proposed Nethery lateral. However, appellants have urged a few contentions more or less general, and of these we shall first take notice.

3. It is insisted that certain parcels of land less than forty-acre tracts carry benefit assessments amounting to several thousand dollars, and that such lands are described in the report and in the findings of the court as “part of” a certain described forty-acre tract, which descriptions are so vague, imperfect and indefinite as to furnish no means of identifying or locating such parcels, and by reason [330]*330thereof the trial court did not have jurisdiction over such lands to establish ditches through or across the same as contemplated, or to make a valid assessment against them.

For aught here pointed out, these several tracts of land are described in the petition and in the drainage commissioners’ report as belonging to the persons therein named, as shown by the last tax duplicate or record of transfers kept by the auditor, and that such parcels of land are there so described. Nor does it appear that the descriptions are such that they cannot be made certain should the necessity arise for so doing. If so, the descriptions are sufficient to give the court jurisdiction to make the assessments. Ager v. State, ex rel. (1904), 162 Ind. 538, 70 N. E. 808; Wabash R. Co. v. Jackson (1911), 176 Ind. 487, 491, 95 N. E. 311, 96 N. E. 466; Seybold v. Rehwald (1912), 177 Ind. 301, 309, 95 N. E. 235; State, ex rel. v. Duncan (1911), 175 Ind. 661, 95 N. E. 127.

4. Appellants make the point that the trial court was without power or authority to order the Nethery lateral constructed over lands in section 10, township 32, range 7, for the reason that no lands in section 10 are described or referred to in the petition or report of the drainage commissioners, and for that reason the court was without jurisdiction over these lands and the owners thereof. We have examined the petition, the report of the drainage commissioners, and the court’s finding of facts without discovering a single reference to section 10. No benefits are assessed or damages awarded to the lands in that section, nor does it appear that the proposed main ditch or any of its laterals will be [331]*331constructed through or even touch any part of the land in that section.

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Bluebook (online)
127 N.E. 197, 189 Ind. 324, 1920 Ind. LEXIS 27, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/northern-indiana-land-co-v-carlin-ind-1920.