Bradley v. Lee
Before: Rhodes, Sprague
Synopsis
Instruction to the Jury.—It is not necessary that a single instruction, given for the purpose of presenting the law upon a point arising upon more than one fact, should contain all the qualifications and provisions that would be necessary if no other instructions were given; and if, in other instructions, the jury are charged with the inquiry concerning those qualifications and provisions, in other portions of the charge, it is sufficient.
Idem. —An assumption m instructions to the jury which, from admissions and in the condition of the evidence in the case, Was not productive of any injury to the appellant, furnish no ground of error.
Idem. — On the trial of a mining Case, the language of an instruction to the jury, “open and subject to appropriation under the local usages of the district,” does not necessarily imply that a mining claim in the actual possession of a person may be re-located by another person, if the person in possession has not taken the necessary steps to give him the constructive possession of the claim.
Local Mining Law. —The true interpretation of the mining usage in the County of Nevada, is, that work to the value of one hundred dollars, or twenty days of faithful labor performed on a claim, or on anyone of a set of adjoining and contiguous claims, owned by the same party, is sufficient to hold the same for one year.
Per Sprague, J., dissenting:
Instructions to a Jury. — An instruction which assumes as a fact established one of the issues tendered by the pleadings, or which assumes that an outstanding title or right of possession in a third person will defeat the plaintiffs’ right of recovery against the defendant, in a mining suit, is error.
Action for Mining Claims.—The rule in actions of ejectment, where the strict legal title is litigated, that proof by the defendant of an outstanding titlo in a stranger will defeat recovery by plaintiff, does not prevail in actions to recover mining claims.
Idem.—In such actions, where the plaintiff relies on prior possession, it is necessary for the defendant to connect himself with the outstanding title to render it effectual against the plaintiff.
Instbuctions to .Tubs,—It is error to submit to the jury, upon the evidence, the construction of an admitted custom which had been determined by the Court in a previous instruction, as the latter instruction has the tendency to nullify or destroy the effect of the first, and to-confirm the jury upon a material question.
Opinion — Rhodes
Rhodes, J., delivered the opinion of the Court: The fifth instruction, given at the request of defendant, is as follows : “Fifth—If the jury believe, from the evidence, that the claims in dispute are adjoining other mining claims and possessions of the Empire Mining Company, or Ophir, or Rich Hills, and that the Empire Mining Company, or its grantors, located the same at a time when they were open and subject to appropriation, under the local usages of the [365]district, and have, during each and every year since said location, including the year in which they were located, performed upon said claims, or upon claims previously held by them, lying immediately contiguous thereto, labor of the value of $100, or twenty days of faithful labor, then the jury must find for the defendant.”
It is objected to this instruction, that it assumes that the modifications of the mining laws, mentioned in the record, had been adopted before the time of the alleged forfeiture by the original locators. The instruction is not, and does not profess to be, a complete charge upon the legal questions to which it relates. It seldom occurs that a single instruction, given for the purpose of presenting the law upon a point arising upon more than one fact, contains all the qualifications and provisos that would be necessary, if no other instruction were given; but it is always intended that such instruction shall be read, together with the other instructions upon the same point, or those involving a consideration of the same facts. Beading this instruction, with the others given in the case, the question is submitted to the jury, whether the plaintiffs failed, during any year after their location, to perform the amount of labor upon the claims required by the mining laws then in force. It also submits the question, whether the claims “were open and subject to appropriation under the local usages of the district.” The question of the performance of labor upon the claims by the Empire Mining Company, in accordance with the mining, laws, was also submitted to the jury. It might have been, technically, more accurate to have submitted, in this instruction, the question as to the amount of labor required by the mining laws to be performed; but it was not necessary, as the jury were fully charged with that inquiry.
It is further objected, that the instruction misconstrues the mining laws in regard to the amount of labor required to be performed, when the same party owns two or more contiguous sets of claims. But we think the construction given by the Court below, to the effect that work upon one set of claims, is, by the mining laws, declared work upon all of such sets of claims; that $100 in value, or twenty days of
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