McNeil v. Kingsbury

WILBUR, C. J.

Petitioner seeks a writ of mandate to compel the surveyor-general of the state to issue to him a prospecting permit authorizing him to prospect for oil upon the grounds of the Norwalk State Hospital for the Insane at Norwalk, California. Petitioner’s application is based upon a statute enacted by the legislature May 25, 1921, going into effect July 29, 1921 (Stats. 1921, p. 404, c. 303). Section 1 of this act provides that all oil and gas and “other mineral deposits in lands belonging to the state, or which may become the property of the state, are hereby reserved to the state;

provided, however,

that nothing in this act shall apply to lands acquired by the state on a sale of delinquent taxes, except such land, the deed for which is required to be filed in the surveyor-general’s office. Such deposits are reserved from sale except upon a rental and royalty basis, as herein provided for; and a purchaser of any lands belonging to the state, or which may become the property of the state, shall acquire no right, title or interest in, or to, such deposits except as hereinafter expressly provided; and the right of such purchaser shall be subject to the reservation of all coal, oil, oil shale, gas, phosphate, sodium, and other mineral deposits, and to the conditions and limitations prescribed by law providing for the state and persons authorized by it to prospect for, mine, and remove such deposits, and to occupy and use so much of the surface of said land as may be required for all purposes reasonably extending to the mining and removal of such deposits therefrom.”

Section 2 provides that all applications to purchase state lands filed subsequent to the passage of the act and all sales shall be subject to this reservation.

The land which the petitioner seeks to prospect for oil was acquired by the state of California under the terms of an act of the legislature of the state of California, approved June 10, 1913, which went into effect June 10, 1913 (Stats. 1913, p. 884, c. 455). This statute provided for the establishment of a state hospital for the care of the insane,

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for the selection of a suitable site therefor, and the erection of the necessary buildings thereon for a hospital for insane persons. It was further provided: “Not more than ninety thousand dollars of the money herein appropriated shall be used for the purchase of said site and water rights. Said site shall contain not less than three hundred acres of tillable land.” It is provided that title to the land “shall be taken in the name of the State of California” (sec. 5). Section 4 of the statute provided: “. . . the control and management of said institution as a hospital for the insane shall be continued as and in the manner provided by law for the control, management and operation of state hospitals for the care of the insane.”