Lobato v. Taylor

71 P. 3d 938 (Colo. 2002)

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Nature of the Case

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Facts

In 1844, the governor of New Mexico granted two Mexican nationals a one-million-acre land grant. The original grantees died during the war between the United States and Mexico. In 1848, the United States and Mexico entered into the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, wherein Mexico ceded land to the United States. The United States agreed to honor existing property rights. Congress confirmed Carlos Beaubien's claim to the Sangre de Cristo grant in the 1860 Act of Confirmation. 12 Stat. 71 (1860). Beaubien attracted settlers with vara strips. Areas not open for cultivation were available for common use. These common areas were used for grazing and recreation and as a source for timber, firewood, fish, and game. In 1863, Beaubien gave established settlers deeds to their vara strips. In 1863, Beaubien executed and recorded a Spanish language document that purports to grant rights of access to common lands to settlers and guarantees that 'all the inhabitants will have enjoyment of benefits of pastures, water, firewood, and timber, always taking care that one does not injure another.' Gilpin bought the land when Beaubien died. Gilpin agreed to provide vara strip deeds to settlers who had not yet received them. The agreement further stated that Gilpin took the land on condition that certain 'settlement rights before then conceded . . . to the residents of the settlements . . . shall be confirmed by said William Gilpin as made by him.' In 1960, Jack Taylor purchased 77,000 acres of the Sangre de Cristo grant (mountain tract) from a successor in interest to William Gilpin. Taylor's deed indicated that he took the land subject to 'claims of the local people by prescription or otherwise to right to pasture, wood, and lumber and so-called settlement rights in, to, and upon said land.' Jack denied the local landowners access to his land and began to fence the property and filed a Torrens title action in the United States District Court for the District of Colorado to perfect his title (Torrens action). The district court ruled that the local landowners did not have any rights to the mountain tract and the court of Appeals affirmed. In 1973, Jack purchased an adjoining, 2,500-acre parcel that was also part of the Sangre de Cristo grant. Jack's predecessor in title had also filed a Torrens title action in 1960 which determined that local landowners had no rights in the estate. Lobato (P) claimed they had settlement rights to the Taylor Ranch and that Taylor (D) had wrongly denied those rights. The court ruled the doctrine of res judicata barred the suit. The court of appeals affirmed. The Colorado Supreme court granted certiorari and reversed and remanded, questioning the constitutional adequacy of the publication notice in the Torrens action. The trial court granted D's motion for summary judgment on the Mexican law claim. The trial, the court made a finding that the landowners or their predecessors in title had 'grazed cattle and sheep, harvested timber, gathered firewood, fished, hunted and recreated on the land of the defendant from the 1800s to the date the land was acquired by the defendant, in 1960.' The court determined that the landowners had not proved prescriptive rights because their use was not adverse; the Beaubien Document was not an effective express grant of rights because it did not identify the parties to the rights or the locations where the rights should be exercised. The court concluded that Colorado law did not recognize the implied rights Ps claimed. The court of appeals affirmed. The Colorado Supreme Court granted certiorari.