State v. O'Laughlin

29 Kan. 20
CourtSupreme Court of Kansas
DecidedJuly 15, 1882
StatusPublished

This text of 29 Kan. 20 (State v. O'Laughlin) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Kansas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
State v. O'Laughlin, 29 Kan. 20 (kan 1882).

Opinion

The opinion of the court was delivered by

Brewer, J.:

The defendants were prosecuted in the district court of Johnson county, on a charge of obstructing a highway in said county. In June, 1877, the defendants were convicted on this charge, and on appeal to this court such conviction was reversed, and the case remanded for a new trial. (19 Kas. 504.) At the second trial, in June, 1878, the defendants \vere again convicted, and from such conviction a second time appeal to this court.

The first question is as to the jurisdiction of the district court. The question was raised by plea in abatement, filed by leave of the court. Upon this question the facts are these: The quarter-section on which the offense is said to have been committed is within the reservation secured to the [22]*22Shawnee Indians by virtue of the treaty of Augusts, 1831, and also a part of the 200,000 acres of said reservation retroceded to the Shawnees by the treaty of November, 1854. It was, under said treaty of 1854, patented in severalty to a member of said tribe, and thereafter conveyed by said patentee by approved deed, long before the time of the alleged offense. The contention is, that this quarter-section never became a part of the territory of Kansas; and this by virtue of the following proviso to the first section of the act of admission :

“That nothing contained in the said constitution respecting the boundary of said state shall be construed to impair the rights of person or property, now pertaining to the Indians of said territory, so long as such rights shall remain unextinguished by treaty between the United States and such Indians, or to include any territory which, by treaty with such Indian tribe, is not, without the consent of such tribe, to be included within the territorial limits or jurisdiction of any state or territory; but all such territory shall be excepted out of the boundaries, and constitute no part of the state of Kansas, until said tribe shall signify their assent to the president of. the United States to be included within said state, or to affect the authority of the government of the United States to make any regulation respecting such Indians, their lands, property, or other rights, by treaty, law, or otherwise, which it would have been competent to make if this act had never passed.”

[23]*231- jm?sdictionof [22]*22The tenth article of the treaty of 1831 provided that the reservation should never be included within the bounds of any state or territory, nor subject to the laws thereof. And if this treaty had remained unchanged and with all its stipulations, and the title to this land had never passed from the Indians, doubtless this contention of defendant would have to be sustained. But the treaty of 1854 expressly ceded this entire reservation back to the government, reserving therefrom 200,000 acres for homes for the Shawnee people. This treaty also provided for an allotment in severalty of such portion of this land as individual Shawnees might select, with a right to patents, and also thereafter to dispose of such [23]*23lands by deeds approved by the secretary of the interior. It further stipulated for the payment of a large sum of' money to said tribe in consideration of such cession and in satisfaction of all claims of said tribe, “and it release of all demands and stipulations arising under former treaties.” In the case of The Kansas Indians, 5 Wall. 737, the supreme court of the United States, while deciding that lands held by the Shawnee Indians in severalty under the treaty of 1854 were not subject to taxation, failed to hold that all the stipulations of the treaty of 1831 were carried into and became a part of the treaty of 1854. The opinion of the supreme court in that case was adverse to the opinion of this court, (3 Kas. 299,) and so far as it goes concludes us. . But the present question was not involved in that case. That court did not decide that these lands were not within the territorial limits of the state of Kansas, but simply that while owned by the Indians they were not taxable. But in the case at bar the lands are no longer1 Indian lands.. Not only were they set apart in severalty to an Indian and patented, but by such Indian they had been properly and legally conveyed. They are not a part of any reservation; they do not belong to and are not in the possession of any Indian. The reasoning in the opinion in the ease of Miami Co. v. Brackenridge, 12 Kas. 114, seems to be applicable. We think the lands were not excluded by said proviso'from the territorial limits of the state, and there being no longer any Indian ownership or possession, the state has full and complete jurisdiction over them. The plea in abatement was properly overruled.

The other errors complained of are in reference to the instructions. It is insisted that the court erred in giving the fourth and eighteenth instructions asked by the state, and in refusing the 21st asked by the defendants. The fourth instruction asked by the state was in respect to a fifteen-years user of the road as a highway. The eighteenth was as follows:

“If the jury find from the evidence that the road com[24]*24monly called the Santa Fé road was declared by the legislature of the territory of Kansas to be a territorial road, and that it was continuously used and traveled by the public until and after the year 1864, and never was vacated by law, then I charge you that the said road became a state road by §14 of ch. 110 of'the laws of Kansas for the year 1864.”

The twenty-first asked by defendant was in reference to the validity of what is called the “Stuck survey.” Now we remark that the record does not affirmatively show the whole of the charge given by the court to the jury. It contains a certain number of instructions asked by the state, as well as certain instructions asked by the defendants, and gives the ruling of the court upon each of these instructions. It contains no general charge of the court, and does not show that one was not given. Neither does it affirmatively show that other instructions were not asked by both the state and the defendants. All that we have before us is the fact that certain instructions were asked by both the state and the defendants, and that the court gave or refused these instructions. Now in reference to such a record, this court has repeatedly ruled: First, as to instructions refused, that they may have béen refused because already given in the general charge, and a refusal to repeat works no error. (Wilson v. Fuller, 9 Kas. 176; Morgan v. Chapple, 10 Kas. 217; DaLee v. Blackburn, 11 Kas. 190; Ferguson v. Graves, 12 Kas. 39; Railroad Co. v. Brown, 14 Kas. 469.)

Second. In reference to instructions given, that unless the instruction is so full and complete, that by other instructions, modifications and qualifications, the whole law applicable to the case could not have been correctly presented to the jury without a contradiction of that given, no allegation of error will be sustained. See 9 and 10 Kansas, supra. It has also been decided that where an error has been committed, it will not be sufficient to justify a reversal of the judgment unless it be one working injury to the substantial rights of the party complaining. (Railroad Co. v. Pointer, 9 Kas. 620; Budd v. Kramer, 14 Kas. 101.) So that whether these instructions given were correct, or not, if upon the undisputed facts of the [25]

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Related

The Kansas Indians
72 U.S. 737 (Supreme Court, 1867)
Blue-Jacket v. Commissioners of Johnson County
3 Kan. 299 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1865)
Wilson v. Fuller
9 Kan. 176 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1872)
Kansas Pacific Railway Co. v. Pointer
9 Kan. 620 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1872)
DaLee v. Blackburn
11 Kan. 190 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1873)
Ferguson v. Graves
12 Kan. 39 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1873)
Comm'rs of Miami Co. v. Brackenridge
12 Kan. 114 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1873)
Budd v. Kramer
14 Kan. 101 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1874)
Pacific Railroad v. Brown
14 Kan. 469 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1875)
State v. O'Laughlin
19 Kan. 504 (Supreme Court of Kansas, 1878)

Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
29 Kan. 20, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/state-v-olaughlin-kan-1882.