United States ex rel. Heirs to the Absentee Wyandotte Allotment of Van Pelt v. Weyerhaeuser Co.

765 F. Supp. 643, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12606, 1991 WL 81206
CourtDistrict Court, D. Oregon
DecidedMay 14, 1991
DocketCiv. No. 90-6516-JO
StatusPublished

This text of 765 F. Supp. 643 (United States ex rel. Heirs to the Absentee Wyandotte Allotment of Van Pelt v. Weyerhaeuser Co.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court, D. Oregon primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
United States ex rel. Heirs to the Absentee Wyandotte Allotment of Van Pelt v. Weyerhaeuser Co., 765 F. Supp. 643, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12606, 1991 WL 81206 (D. Or. 1991).

Opinion

OPINION

ROBERT E. JONES, District Judge:

The United States brings this action to regain title to an eighty-acre tract of land in Klamath County, Oregon for the heirs of an Indian allottee. The United States, on behalf of the heirs of the allottee, requests an ejectment of defendant, a return of the land, and damages for nearly fifty years of alleged wrongful occupancy by defendant. The court has jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1345.

In 1904, Congress passed a statute authorizing Absentee Wyandotte Indians to select 80 acres of agricultural lands from the surveyed public nonmineral domain. Under the statute, a patent was to be issued to the Absentee Wyandotte Indians by the United States subject to the “condition that the lands covered thereby shall not be aliened without the consent of the Secretary of the Interior.”

On March 28, 1907, the United States issued a restricted fee title in property known as the Absentee Wyandotte Allot[645]*645ment of Laura M. Van Pelt (Van Pelt), issuing the restricted fee title to Van Pelt, the United States included the recital “[t]hat the said land shall not be aliened without the consent of the Secretary of the Interior.” In

While the Van Pelt allotment remained subject to the restriction on alienation, and without obtaining the consent of the Secretary of the Interior, Laura M. Prof, formerly Van Pelt, executed a deed and purported to sell the allotment to J.W. Farnell on May 26, 1917.

On May 19, 1923, the warranty deed to Farnell was filed in the Klamath County records. On May 21, 1923, the United States filed the patent to Van Pelt in the Klamath County records.

Between 1917 and 1942, the Van Pelt Allotment was conveyed several times without the consent or knowledge of the Secretary of the Interior. On December 24, 1942, Weyerhaeuser Company (defendant) purported to acquire title to the Van Pelt Allotment.

The United States contends that because the attempted sale by Van Pelt on May 26, 1917 was not approved by the Secretary of the Interior, the deed was null and void and did not convey title to the property. Because defendant’s title originated with the invalid 1917 conveyance, the United States claims defendant’s title is subject to the claim of the United States who holds title to the property for the heirs of Van Pelt.

The United States submits that it attempted to settle the matter with defendant in 1986-1988. Defendant has refused to quiet title in the heirs of Van Pelt or to compensate the heirs for defendant’s extensive trespass.

Defendant moves to dismiss the action under Fed.R.Civ.P. 17(a) or, in the alternative, moves for an order to substitute the heirs of Van Pelt as the proper plaintiffs under Fed.R.Civ.P. 19(a).

Defendant states the following in support of its motion: 1) the United States has no standing because the real property in question was not Indian lands held in trust by the United States, but rather lands in the public domain and 2) the United States has no standing because the acts complained of occurred after the United States’ rights in the property were extinguished by the issuance of its patent.

QUESTIONS PRESENTED BY DEFENDANT

1. Is the United States the real party in interest? [Yes]

2. Does the United States have standing to sue when the allotment at issue was unpatented land from the public domain? [Yes, the United States has standing because the land is subject to a restricted fee patent]

3. Does the United States have standing to sue when the transaction at issue took place after the original patent was issued? [Yes, the patent is the source of a continuing, rather than the termination, of the United States’ trust obligation]

4. Should the heirs of Van Pelt be substituted for the United States as the proper plaintiff? [No]

FED.R.CIV.P. 17(a)

Fed.R.Civ.P. 17(a) provides:
Every action shall be prosecuted in the name of the real party in interest.... and when a statute of the United States so provides, an action for the use or benefit of another shall be brought in the name of the United States. No action shall be dismissed on the ground that it is not prosecuted in the name of the real party in interest until a reasonable time has been allowed after objection for ratification of commencement of the action by, or joinder or substitution of, the real party in interest; and such ratification, joinder, or substitution shall have the same effect as if the action had been commenced in the name of the real party in interest.

The defendant submits that because the United States has neither alleged nor has defendant found any statute of the United States enabling the United States to bring this action on behalf of the heirs of Van Pelt, the complaint should be dismissed or the heirs of Van Pelt should be substituted.

[646]*646The United States correctly points out that the lack of an authorizing statute does not render the United States an improper plaintiff. Although federal statutes may exist authorizing the United States to bring action on behalf of another, the United States “is of course the real party in interest as to claim regarding U.S. properties or interests.” Schwarzer, Tashima, & Wag-staffe, Federal Civil Procedure Before Trial, § 7:18 (1991).

The special provision for actions for the use and benefit of another refers only to statutory proceedings. It does not preclude the institution of nonstatutory actions in the name of the United States for the benefit of another in circumstances in which an obligation exists on the part of the government to bring suit on behalf of a private party.

6A Wright, Miller, & Kane, Federal Practice and Procedure, § 1551 (1990) (footnotes omitted).

Further,
it is no longer open to question that the United States has capacity to sue for the purpose of setting aside conveyances of lands allotted to Indians under its care, where restrictions upon alienation have been transgressed.... [T]he precise question has been determined by this court in Heckman v. United States [224 U.S. 413, 32 S.Ct. 424, 56 L.Ed. 820 (1912) ] ... and it was there held that the authority to enforce restrictions of this character is the necessary complement of the power to impose them.

Bowling v. United States, 233 U.S. 528, 534-36, 34 S.Ct. 659, 660-61, 58 L.Ed. 1080 (1914).

The federal courts have consistently allowed the United States to bring suits based on the United States’ trust responsibility to allottees issued fee patents with restrictions on alienation.

The United States is the real party in interest.

STANDING

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765 F. Supp. 643, 1991 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 12606, 1991 WL 81206, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/united-states-ex-rel-heirs-to-the-absentee-wyandotte-allotment-of-van-pelt-ord-1991.