Yuba Investment Co. v. Yuba Consolidated Gold Fields

194 P. 19, 184 Cal. 469, 1920 Cal. LEXIS 346
CourtCalifornia Supreme Court
DecidedDecember 7, 1920
DocketSac. No. 2797.
StatusPublished
Cited by12 cases

This text of 194 P. 19 (Yuba Investment Co. v. Yuba Consolidated Gold Fields) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Yuba Investment Co. v. Yuba Consolidated Gold Fields, 194 P. 19, 184 Cal. 469, 1920 Cal. LEXIS 346 (Cal. 1920).

Opinion

WILBUR, J.

This is an action to quiet title. Plaintiff recovered judgment and defendant appeals. Both parties claim under James O’Brien, who on December 6, 1901, made a quitclaim deed of the property to the United States of America, containing certain agreements, reservations, and exceptions. The interpretation of this deed forms the basis of this controversy. The title of the United States was conveyed to the defendant October 30, 1911. Whatever interest in the property remained in the grantor, except as noted near the end of this opinion, was conveyed to the plaintiff. The plaintiff contends, and the trial court held, that the deed to the government merely conveyed an easement; that this casement *471 was abandoned by the government, and, consequently, its subsequent conveyance to the defendant was of no effect. The defendant on the other hand, claims that the deed of 0 ’Brien conveyed the fee to the government and that the proper decision of the case turns on the nature and extent of the rights reserved to O’Brien and conveyed by him to the plaintiff. The pivotal question in the case is whether or not the government acquired a mere easement. Such facts as are necessary to the determination of that preliminary question will now be stated, and later, in considering the other questions involved, such additional facts will be stated as are necessary to an understanding and decision of such points.

At the time of the conveyance O’Brien was the owner of a large amount of land in the bed and on both banks of Tuba River, a tributary to the Sacramento River. Some of this land was known to contain placer gold. The California Debris Commission, in order to preserve the navigability of the Sacramento River, planned to impound the detritus in the Tuba River resulting from mining operations, thus preventing its deposit in the Sacramento River, by constructing certain reclamation works, including dams and levees, to form a settling basin on the land of O’Brien. For that purpose negotiations were entered into with him with a view to acquiring the necessary land and rights for such purposes. The deed in question resulted. It covered not only the parcel of land involved in this suit, but by separate description and different reservations and exceptions certain other large tracts of land. These various parcels of land are separated into three tracts, with different reservations applying to each. These tracts are designated “First,” “Second,” and “Third.” Tract “First,” the land in controversy, contains over one thousand acres, and most of it is designated upon a plat attached to and made a part of the deed as “South Basin.” Tract “Second” in large part lies between the official banks of the Tuba River. Tract “Third” contains 442 acres, and is bounded on the north by the official left bank of the Tuba River, and on the south by the Linda Levee, and is marked “Dredging Ground” on such plat. This tract is owned by the defendant and is spoken of throughout the brief as the “442 acre tract.” The granting clause of the conveyance is the usual quitclaim, stating that’ the grantor “has remised, released, and forever quitclaimed,” etc., to the *472 United States of America the parcels of land shown upon the attached map and thereinafter more particularly described. The habendum clause is in the usual form to the grantee and its successors. The reservations and exceptions relate to the precious metals, the right to extract the same, the deposit of detritus and the use and occupation of the premises.

The Reservation and Exceptions Concerning Use.

The reservation of the use of tract “First” is as follows: “But reserving and excepting unto said party of the first part, his heirs and assigns . . . the use and possession of such premises in so far as the same may not interfere with the use and possession of the premises by said party of the second part, its authorized agents, employees or contractors, for awy and dll purposes that it or they may see fit to use the same, said use and possession so reserved to be subject to all the rules and regulations and orders of the said party of the second part, its agents and employees.”

In tract “Second,” which was covered by placer mining claims, the reservation with reference to the use is as follows: “But reserving and excepting unto said party of the first part, Ms heirs and assigns, the use and possession of said premises in so far as the party of the first part would otherwise be entitled to by virtue of said mining claims.” Then follows a proviso similar to that with reference to tract “First” above quoted, to the effect that such use must not interfere with the use and occupation by the government. But it is also stated that: “This reservation shall in nowise be construed as granting, confirming or conceding to the grantor the validity of said mining claims. ’ ’

There is no specific reservation of the right to use tract “Third,” except that there is also reserved “the right to extract precious metals therefrom.”

The Reservation of Precious Metal.

The reservations and exceptions with reference to precious metals are different in the different tracts. In tract “First” the grantor reserves and excepts “all precious metals in or on said premises and the use and possession of said premises, ’ ’ etc. In tract “Second” the grantor merely reserves the right to the use and possession of the same as mining claims. In tract “TMrd” the grantor reserves and excepts all precious *473 metals in or on said premises, with the right to extract the same.

There is nothing in the granting clause of the deed which in anywise limits the title conveyed, nor do the reservations or exceptions expressly limit it. No right reserved is at all inconsistent with the grant of a fee in tract “First,” except the right to the use and occupation of the premises which, according to the terms of the reservations and exceptions, is at all times subject to the grantee’s use for any and all purposes for which it may see fit to use the same. If in the reservation of the right to the use and occupation of the premises such right was merely subordinate to the use of the same premises by the government as a settling basin or for works erected for the purpose of impounding detritus in the Tuba River, the argument that the deed merely conveyed an easement to the government for that purpose would be much stronger. Before finally determining the proper construction of the deed, it remains to be considered whether the other provisions of the deed, and the facts and circumstances relied upon by respondent in connection with the execution of the instrument now to be stated, aid in such determination.

Gold mining in this neighborhood is conducted by dredgers, floating on an artificial pond, which handle all the material from the surface to the bedrock. Tract “Third,” designated upon the map as “Dredging Ground,” is to be completely surrounded by banks and levees constructed by the grantor. This tract is referred to in the deed as the tract of land “to which said miming privilege applies,” and it is provided that the embankments constructed by the grantor surrounding this parcel “shall be sufficiently thick and strong to permit the land swrrounding the same to be safely used as a settling basin.”

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
194 P. 19, 184 Cal. 469, 1920 Cal. LEXIS 346, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/yuba-investment-co-v-yuba-consolidated-gold-fields-cal-1920.