The decree of the circuit court, affirmed by the circuit court
of appeals, dismissing the bill in this case on the ground of
laches was correct, and that decree is affirmed.
This was a bill in equity, filed in the United States Circuit
Court for the District of Minnesota by the widow (since remarried)
and heirs at law of George W. Remsen against the Minnesota Railway
Transfer Company and over two hundred other defendants to establish
title to 160 acres of land situate within the corporate limits of
the City of St. Paul, which the complainants contended was held in
trust for them by the defendants. The land was estimated to be of
the value of over one million dollars.
The facts of the case are substantially as follows: George W.
Remsen was a private in Company K, 3d Regiment, United States
Infantry, and served in the Mexican war. By virtue of his
enlistment as a soldier he became entitled, under section 9 of the
Act of Congress of February 11, 1847, c. 8, 9 Stat. 123, to locate
a quarter section of government land, subject to private entry,
under the regulations and restrictions established by the
Commissioner of the General Land Office. This section further
provided that, in case of the death of
Page 169 U. S. 238
the soldier, his right under the act should descend to his widow
and minor children, and further that in the event of the issuance
of a land warrant to the minor children of a deceased soldier,
"then the legally constituted guardian of such minor children
shall, in conjunction with such of the children, if any, as may be
of full age upon being duly authorized by the orphans' or other
court having probate jurisdiction, have power to sell and dispose
of such certificate or warrant for the benefit of those
interested."
Remsen died in the military service in October, 1847, and
thereafter a land warrant was issued on September 30, 1848, to
"Elizabeth Remsen, widow, Harriet A. Remsen, Mary Ann Remsen,
John W. Remsen, Elizabeth Remsen, and George W. A. Remsen,
children, heirs at law, of George W. Remsen, deceased."
On October 6, 1848, Mrs. Remsen qualified as guardian of all the
minor children of Remsen (except Harriet A. who was then seventeen
years of age) before the Orphans' Court for the County of
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
The land warrant issued to the widow and minor children of
Remsen was never located by any or either of them, but was sold and
assigned on October 11, 1848, to one Nathan C. D. Taylor, of St.
Croix County, Territory of Minnesota, who subsequently located it
upon the land in controversy, and to whom a patent was issued by
the government on March 20, 1850, and from whom all the defendants
in this case, directly or indirectly, claim title.
The sale and assignment of the warrant were made without an
order authorizing or confirming it, so far as appears, of the
orphans' court appointing Mrs. Remsen as guardian, and was
consummated by Mrs. Remsen, acting in her own right and as the
guardian of the minor children, with whom was joined Harriet A.
Remsen.
It was contended by the complainants in the circuit court, as
well as in the circuit court of appeals, that the sale and
assignment of the land warrant to Taylor was utterly void as to the
interests of all the minor children of George W. Remsen other than
Harriet A. who joined in the assignment, because the sale and
assignment made by the mother as guardian
Page 169 U. S. 239
was not authorized by any order or decree of the Orphans' Court
of the County of Philadelphia.
The circuit court dismissed the bill on the ground of laches. 56
F. 919. Upon appeal, that decree was affirmed by the Circuit Court
of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, 65 F. 23, whereupon the
complainants appealed to this Court.
MR. JUSTICE BROWN, after stating the facts in the foregoing
language, delivered the opinion of the Court.
The circuit court dismissed this bill on the ground of laches,
and the circuit court of appeals affirmed its action . There can be
no doubt whatever of the correctness of this conclusion. Indeed, a
stronger case for the application of the doctrine of laches can
scarcely be imagined. The warrant, which was issued in 1848,
entitled the widow and minor children of Remsen to a grant of 160
acres of public lands. This warrant was never located by the
persons to whom it was issued, who appeared to have lived in
Philadelphia, and to have been in straitened circumstances.
The warrant was sold by them in 1848 to Nathan C. D. Taylor, and
there is nothing to show that it did not realize for the widow and
heirs its market value. Indeed, the court of appeals found that it
was sold for its full value, and the widow testified that the
proceeds were applied to the support of herself and the minor
children of the deceased soldier. No fraud in the transaction was
alleged or proved. Nothing appears to impeach the validity of the
sale except the fact that the widow, who had been appointed
guardian of all the minor children except the eldest, did not
procure the consent of the orphans' court in Philadelphia to make
the sale, as required by the
Page 169 U. S. 240
statute. This was doubtless a technical defect, but it did not
show that the warrant was not actually transferred by the widow,
acting for herself and her children (except one who consented in
her own behalf), or that they did not receive full consideration
for such transfer.
It is true that the locator and his grantees in possession may
have been, in law, chargeable with the knowledge that an order of
the orphans' court was never obtained, but in view of the fact that
the widow and heirs of Remsen lived in Philadelphia, a thousand
miles from St. Paul, it is scarcely a matter of surprise that they
did not investigate this subject with that care which they probably
would have exercised had that court been more accessible.
Particularly is this so when it is considered that the officers of
the Land Department subsequently, and after a full review of the
facts, decided the warrant to have been properly transferred to
Taylor, and issued a patent to him.
It was not the foresight of the widow or heirs of Remsen which
caused this warrant to be located upon lands so near to the
thriving City of St. Paul, but that of Taylor, who appears to have
been a resident of Minnesota, and this suit is a manifest attempt
of the complainants to take to themselves the benefit of his
action, in which they did not participate, and of which they were
entirely ignorant for over 30 years after the location had been
made.
Conceding that the minors were not affected by laches until they
became of age, it appears that the youngest of them reached his
majority in 1863, at which time the lands were worth about $1,500.
Then, if not before, the exercise of diligence became incumbent
upon them. It was their duty to have informed themselves, and to
have acted. It is scarcely possible that they should not have known
that their father was a soldier in the Mexican war, and they were
chargeable by law with knowledge of the fact that he was entitled
to a land warrant. If they did not know this as a matter of fact,
it was because their mother and eldest sister had failed to inform
them of it, and it is inequitable to charge upon the defendants the
entire consequences of this ignorance.
Page 169 U. S. 241
Knowledge of the transfer seems to have finally come to them not
through any exertion of their own to inform themselves of the
facts, but by an accidental meeting with a lawyer from Minnesota
who had in some way -- probably by an examination of the title --
become cognizant of the defect in the transfer. It was a mere
matter of chance when they would be informed of the defect in the
defendants' title, or whether it would ever come to their knowledge
at all. To permit them now, after a lapse of forty-four years from
the time the warrant was issued, and of thirty years from the time
the youngest child became of age, to impeach the transaction, would
be an act of the most flagrant injustice to the present holders of
the property. This property, which was probably not worth more than
one or two hundred dollars at the time of the location of the land
warrant, is now estimated to be worth at least a million, and is
covered, or partly covered, by houses and business blocks. In the
44 years that have elapsed since the warrant was issued, these
lands have been platted and sold in lots to purchasers, who were
probably ignorant in fact, if not in law, of any defect in the
title, and relied upon the validity of the transfer from the widow
and heirs of Remsen, and upon the patent from the United States,
which appears to have been regularly issued after an examination of
all the facts attending the granting, transfer, and location of the
land warrant by the officers of the Land Department. While the fact
that the complainants were ignorant of the defect in the title, and
were without means to prosecute an investigation into the facts may
properly be considered by the court, it does not mitigate the
hardship to the defendants of unsettling these titles. If the
complainants may put forward these excuses for delay after thirty
years, there is no reason why they may not allege the same as an
excuse after a lapse of sixty. The truth is, there must be some
limit of time within which these excuses shall be available, or
titles might forever be insecure. The interests of public order and
tranquility demand that parties shall acquaint themselves with
their rights within a reasonable time, and, although this time may
be extended by their actual ignorance, or any of means, it is by no
means illimitable.
Page 169 U. S. 242
If any authority were needed for the action of the courts below
in dismissing the bill upon the ground of laches, it would be found
in
Felix v. Patrick, 145 U. S. 317. In
that case, a half-breed woman, belonging to the Sioux Nation,
received in 1857 a certificate of land scrip, issued under the then
existing law, which provided that no "transfer or conveyance of any
of said certificates shall be valid." Notwithstanding this
provision, the woman sold the scrip and executed a blank power of
attorney, also a quitclaim deed in blank, in which the name of the
attorney, the description of the land, and the name of the grantee
were afterwards filled in by the grantee, who had caused the papers
to be executed. The grantee thereafter located a tract of land, and
subsequently Congress confirmed his title to the same. The
half-breed was ignorant of all these facts until 1887. In 1888, she
having died in the meantime, her representatives filed a bill in
equity against the grantee, charging him with having fraudulently
obtained the power of attorney and the quitclaim deed, but failing
to state when and how the frauds were discovered. It was held that,
as the bill did not state the time when the frauds were discovered,
so that the court might clearly see whether they could have been
discovered before, the bill was fatally defective, and that, under
the circumstances, it would be inequitable to disturb the title of
the defendants, who held adversely as against the half-breed woman,
and not by virtue of the power of attorney or quitclaim deed, which
passed no title, or by the confirmatory act of Congress, which
granted no additional rights.
Upon the facts disclosed in this record, it is entirely clear
that the decree of the court below was correct, and it is
therefore
Affirmed.
