Palmer v. Galvin

California Supreme Court Mar 25, 1887 No. No. 9556Published

Before: Belcher

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Holding. The court held that a defendant in an ejectment action who lacks a claim to the title cannot challenge the validity of a city-issued deed granted under the Act of Congress of July 1, 1870.

Issues

Whether the lot in question was part of the Point San José Military Reservation granted to the city by the Act of Congress of July 1, 1870.
Whether a defendant without a claim to the title may challenge the plaintiff's status as a beneficiary under the Act of Congress of July 1, 1870.

Disposition. affirmed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“The defendant having intruded upon the actual possession of the plaintiff, the possession which he thus acquired was mala fide, as between themselves and in the sense of the statute.”

“one who has no claim to it himself cannot raise the question whether the grantee was a beneficiary and entitled as such to the conveyance”

Synopsis

Appeal from a judgment of the city and county of San Francisco, and from an order refusing a new trial.

The facts are stated in the opinion.

Belcher, C. C. This is an action of ejectment to recover possession of a fifty-vara lot lying at the southwest corner of Beach and Hyde Streets, in the city and county of San Francisco.

The plaintiff claimed to be the owner of the lot, and to establish his title, proved at the trial the following facts:—

On the 6th of November, 1850, the President of the United States made an order exempting and reserving from sale, for public purposes, certain lands situate on the peninsula of San Francisco at Point San José, or Black Point.

On the 31st of December, 1851, this order was modified by the President so as to embrace as Point San Joséonly the following-described tract, viz.: “The promontory of Point San José within boundaries of not less than eight hundred yards from its northern extremity.”

[185]On the 1st of July, 1870, an act of Congress was approved entitled “ An act to relinquish the interest of the United States in certain lands to the city and county of San Francisco.” By this act a portion of the “ Point San José Military Reservation ” was granted to the city and county for the following uses and purposes: —

“1. To maintain all streets and alleys as now laid out upon the official map of the city of San Francisco; 2. And then in trust to grant and convey the remainder of said lands to the parties severally who are, at the date of the passage of this act, in the actual bona fide possession thereof by themselves or their tenants, and in such parcels as the same are so held and possessed by them, or .who, if they have not such possesson, were deprived thereof by the United States military authorities when they went into the occupancy of the said military reservation, or were deprived thereof by intruders or trespassers against whom possession may be recovered by legal process.”

The plaintiff claimed to be one of the beneficiaries . provided for in the act, and thereafter, in pursuance of its provision, a deed of the lot in question, dated December 24, 1870, and duly executed, was made and delivered to him by the city and county.

The plaintiff then went into possession of the lot, and remained in possession of it until within five years before the commencement of the action, when the defendant entered.

The defendant by his answer denied all the allegations of the complaint, and pleaded the statute of limitations, but at the trial introduced no testimony bearing upon the issues presented.

Palmer v. Galvin

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