Gainer v. Nelson
Gainer v. Nelson
Opinion of the Court
This is an appeal from an order sustaining a general demurrer to the bill of complaint.
The bill charges, in substance, that Cheboygan river, Indian river, Mullet Lake, Black river, and Upper Black river are streams and lakes within the borders of Cheboygan county, and in said waters, and in the banks, channels, bottoms, and otherwise, are logs and forest products
It is seen that the theory of the bill is that by the contract with the committee of the board of supervisors the complainant acquired a present title or interest in all the timber and deadheads in the stream at the date of the contract. It is very doubtful whether the parties to this agreement intended that any present title or right was conveyed. It is a reasonable construction that the complainants were expected to accept as compensation such “salvage ” as they might obtain from the logs removed at the time when under the contract they should — at any
Numerous reasons are urged against this claimed power:
(1) That this is an attempted work of interrial improvement ; (2) that the attempt to confer title to these logs on complainants is an attempt to confiscate the property without due process of law; and (3) that the statute relied upon for authority is not broad enough to confer power upon the board to make the contract in question.
It implies no want of appreciation of the force of the two first contentions that we rest our decision upon the third. The statute relied upon is 1 Comp. Laws, § 2494, which reads:
“Every such board of supervisors shall have power, within their respective counties, to permit or prohibit the construction of any dam or bridge over or across any nav-, igable stream. They shall also have power to provide for the removal of any obstruction arising from the erection of booms, or collecting of logs or rafts in such streams by any individual, and to direct the time in which, and places where, persons having logs, rafts and boats in such streams shall be allowed to remain, and when the same shall be removed; and may impose such penalties as they deem necessary to enforce such regulations, and authorize the sheriffs, or their deputies, to carry into effect the regular tions made under the provisions of this act.”
The complainants’ counsel attempts to eliminate from the statute what does not apply to this case, and produces the following:
“Every such board of supervisors shall have power, within their respective counties * * * to provide for the removal of any obstruction arising from the * * * collecting of logs * * * in such streams, by any individual.”
We think this abstract omits controlling words of the
Decree is affirmed, with costs.
Case-law data current through December 31, 2025. Source: CourtListener bulk data.