Denny v. Northern Pacific Railway Co.

Citations

• 19 Wash. 298
• 53 P. 341
• 1898 Wash. LEXIS 366

Syllabus

<p>TIDE LANDS — PREFERENCE RIGHT TO PURCHASE — RES JUDICATAPLEADING.</p> <p>A judgment against plaintiff in an action seeking to. enjoin defendants from wharfing a strip of tide land abutting on land purchased hy them' of plaintiff, which disputed strip had been occupied by them over twenty years, is conclusive on the parties and those claiming through them, as to the title to the disputed strip.</p> <p>Under Laws 1895, pp. 554, 562, §§ 61, 82, providing that in contests before the board of land commissioners respecting the right to purchase tide lands, no formal pleadings are necessary, and that on appeal to the superior court the contest may he tried upon the same pleadings unless ordered amended by the court, a judgment In another action, constituting res judicata, may he proven without being pleaded.</p> <p>Where one holding a government patent covering upland and tide land conveys a portion of the upland, it passes to the grantee littoral rights in the abutting tide land, and a possession of such abutting tide land hy the grantee for more than twenty years, in connection with the state’s disclaimer to patented lands, would constitute a perfect title in the grantee.</p> <p>Under the provisions of the statute giving the upland owner the preference right of purchasing adjoining tide lands, no right is given tie owner of a piece of tide land to come in as a preferred purchaser of abutting tide land.</p> <p>Where the boundaries of a disputed strip of tide land have been recognized for twenty-five years both by contract and the conduct of coterminous proprietors as appurtenant to a certain portion of the upland, and the authorities have platted the tide land in conformity with such lines, which have been adopted by the contestants in presenting their respective applications to purchase, the objection cannot be raised by the appellant that the disputed tideland, owing to the conformation of the shore, really abuts upon other lands than those of respondents.</p>