Paxson v. Collins

100 So. 2d 672
CourtDistrict Court of Appeal of Florida
DecidedFebruary 13, 1958
DocketNo. 57-345
StatusPublished
Cited by8 cases

This text of 100 So. 2d 672 (Paxson v. Collins) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Paxson v. Collins, 100 So. 2d 672 (Fla. Ct. App. 1958).

Opinion

E. HARRIS DREW, Associate Judge.

Appellants own land in Dade County bordering on navigable water. The original conveyance out of the United States described the property as government lots, the southerly boundary of each being shown on the surveys at that time to border on navigable water. In their complaint to quiet title they allege that subsequent to the date of the acquisition of the said land from the United States by their predecessors in title, said lots had increased in size by the gradual imperceptible and natural action of the waters adjacent thereto in depositing soil along the foreshore and that such accretion had materially increased the area of said government lots; the complaint described such accreted lands and it was then alleged that certain defendants, therein named, who owned adjacent government lots claimed a portion of said accreted lands had accreted to their uplands instead of appellants’ and that such claim constituted a cloud, doubt or suspicion upon the title to plaintiffs’ said lands. Many of the defendants who were alleged to claim some right, title or interest in the lands that had allegedly accreted to plaintiffs were residents of Dade County but many were non-residents or their residences were alleged to have been unknown. The Trustees of the Internal Improvement Fund were named defendants as was the Central and Southern Florida Flood Control District. As a basis for naming both [674]*674bodies defendants the complaint alleged that the Trustees had conveyed an easement over a portion of the accreted lands to the Flood Control District, that such easement was recorded in Dade County and constituted a cloud upon the title to plaintiffs’ lands. Moreover, the complaint alleged that the Trustees, claiming to own plaintiffs’ land, had approved a proposed sale of other parts of said accreted lands to third parties and that a conveyance of said lands would issue unless said Trustees were restrained from so doing. The complaint in other respects was in the usual form of a complaint to quiet title and in addition to the plaintiffs’ prayer that the title to the land be quieted as against the claims of all of said defendants, including the Trustees, it prayed that said Trustees be enjoined from making any conveyance of said accreted lands or otherwise encumbering the same.

The Trustees moved to dismiss the complaint on the ground that the venue was in Leon County and not in Dade County. Mason Lumber Co. v. Lee, 126 Fla. 371, 171 So. 332; Gay v. Ogilvie, Fla.1950, 47 So.2d 525; Gaulden v. Gay, Fla.1950, 47 So.2d 580; McCarty v. Lichtenberg, Fla.1953, 67 So.2d 655; Florida Real Estate Commission v. State ex rel. Bodner, Fla.1954, 75 So.2d 290; Larson v. R. K. Cooper, Inc., Fla.1954, 75 So.2d 757; East Coast Grocery Company v. Collins, Fla.1957, 96 So.2d 793. The motion of the Trustees was granted, the cause was dismissed as to them and the matter is now before us on certiorari for the purpose of determining the correctness of that ruling. The motion of the Trustees deals with said lands as “submerged sovereignty lands” and it is their theory, presented in the motion and argued orally and in the briefs, that plaintiffs have no title to said lands and that, therefore, they the Trustees, “cannot comprehend how the plaintiffs can seek to quiet title to lands when they do not hold title or right thereto.” If this theory be sound their conclusion would be, but the theory is unsound for the reason that, on the motion to dismiss, the allegations of the complaint are taken as true, and the complaint concerns the title to accreted lands alleged to be vested in the plaintiffs. In Mexico Beach Corporation v. St. Joe Paper Co., District Court of Appeal, 1st District, 97 So.2d 708, 710, a case factually quite similar to this one, the able opinion prepared by Judge Wigginton for the Court concluded on overwhelming authority, including numerous decisions of the Supreme Court of Florida, that:

“In the United States, ‘The rule governing additions to land bounded by a river, lake or sea, has been much discussed and variously settled by usage and by positive law. Almost all jurists and legislators, however, both ancient and modern, have agreed that the owner of the land thus bounded is entitled to these additions. By some, the rule has been vindicated on the principles of natural justice, that he who sustains the burden of losses and of repairs, imposed by the contiguity of waters, ought to receive whatever benefits they may bring by accretion; by others, it is derived from the principle of public policy, that it is the interest of the community that all land should have an owner, and most convenient that insensible additions to the shores should follow the title to the shore itself.’ The common-law rule which vests title to soil formed along navigable waters by accretion or reliction in owners of abutting lands is the rule applicable in Florida.”

The Trustees place great reliance upon East Coast Grocery Company v. Collins, supra, and similar cases holding that an injunction suit against the Trustees could not be brought in a county other than Leon (the seat of the Capital) under the guise of a suit to quiet title. This contention, however, is wholly without merit under the allegations of the complaint in this cause. The complaint is not a suit for injunction in the guise of a suit to quiet title but presents a genuine, [675]*675legitimate and proper case determinable only by the Circuit Court of Dade County in which the lands are located. Moreover, in East Coast Grocery Company v. Collins, supra, had the Supreme Court concluded that that suit was not a subterfuge but one brought in good faith to quiet title, the conclusion there would have been altogether different for in that case the Court said [96 So.2d 795]:

“No deed has been executed constituting a cloud on appellant’s title, or affecting his riparian rights, and if appellant ultimately prevails none will be executed.
"Having this conviction, zve judge the suit to he one that should he instituted in Leon County," (Emphasis supplied.)

And so it may be said that the foregoing case is authority in fact upon which the conclusion may properly be reached that this litigation was correctly brought in Dade County and that the Trustees were lawfully named therein as defendants.

The laws provide that suits to quiet title should be brought in the circuit court of the county in which the land lies. Article V, Section 11, Florida Constitution, F.S.A.; Section 66.41 Florida Statutes 1955, F.S.A. The cases of the Supreme Court requiring the Trustees to be sued in Leon County were never intended, nor can they be construed as preventing a landowner, having a legitimate cause of action, from securing a decree quieting his title against the Trustees.

The reasons for the promulgation of the “state agency venue rule” are stated in many of the numerous cases of the Supreme Court of Florida cited in this opinion. In the case of Gay v. Ogilvie, supra [47 So.2d 526], we find the following detailed discussion of principles involved:

“ * * * there are two types or classes of cases where rules and regulations promulgated by state agencies— and let us now add, where official action taken by state agencies under existing statutes — may be brought into question in suits properly instituted for such purposes.

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Bluebook (online)
100 So. 2d 672, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/paxson-v-collins-fladistctapp-1958.