Chauvin v. Louisiana Oyster Commission

Citations

• 121 La. 10
• 46 So. 38
• 1907 La. LEXIS 676

Syllabus

<p>1. Public Lands — Patent from State — Collateral Attack.</p> <p>Neither the state nor any of its agents can attack a state patent valid on its face in a collateral proceeding.</p> <p>2. Same — Swamp and Overflowed Lands.</p> <p>The acceptance by the state of lands certified to it by the Secretary of the Interior as “swamp and overflowed” is conclusive upon the state as to the title to and character of the lands so certified and subsequently sold by the state as such.</p> <p>Qn Rehearing.</p> <p>3. States — State Boards — Authority.</p> <p>Whilst the authority of a public corporation, created as an agent of the state, may be very extensive in the direction in which it is intended to be used, such agent has not only less authority in other directions than the ordinary citizen, but has none whatever; and the authority conferred upon it can be sustained only in so far as not devested or controlled by authority emanating from the same or a higher source.</p> <p>4. Public Lands — Sale of State Lands— Oyster Commission — Powers.</p> <p>The state, through its agents, having sold a particular tract of land as susceptible of private ownership, the oyster commission, another agent, charged with the control of oyster beds and water bottoms suitable for oyster beds, has no authority or standing in court to deny • or attack the validity of such sale.</p> <p>5. Same — Right to Bring Action.</p> <p>In a litigation between a possessor of land, bolding under a patent from the state, and the oyster commission, the latter being without capacity to stand in judgment for the state with respect to the validity of such patent, and the state itself not being a party to the litigation, no judgment can be rendered on that question by which the state can be bound.</p> <p>(Syllabus by the Court.)</p>