Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee

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Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee
L. Ed.
453
Holding
The Virginia Court of Appeals was mistaken in denying the validity of the Fairfax land titles, the Virginia Court rejected the U.S. Supreme Court's mandate.
Court membership
Chief Justice
John Marshall
Associate Justices
Bushrod Washington · William Johnson
H. Brockholst Livingston · Thomas Todd
Gabriel Duvall · Joseph Story

Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee, 11 U.S. (7 Cranch) 603 (1813),

United States Supreme Court case arising out of the acquisition of lands originally granted by the British King Charles II (then in exile) in 1649 to Lord Fairfax in the Northern Neck and westward (all in what became the state of Virginia).[2]

Historical background

Basically, settlers who developed the once-forested

Greenway Court hunting lodge in 1781. Lord Fairfax left most of his Virginia land to his nephew Denny Martin Fairfax, who did not want to leave England. Martin's younger brother, Thomas B. Martin, who had for years been trying to collect land rents from western settlers, and for whom Martinsburg, West Virginia would be named, received Greenway Court, where he died in 1792.[3]

Immediately before the American Revolutionary War, one of Lord Fairfax's surveyors in western Virginia was Thomas Marshall, now better known as the father of Supreme Court justice John Marshall, and who at the time lived in central Virginia on part of Lord Fairfax' Leeds Manor tract, on land leased from Richard Henry Lee.[4] Meanwhile, while not even surveying was complete for western acreage (and many surveys conflicted), considerable land even further west in Virginia claimed by Lord Fairfax's descendants had been cleared and developed by others, including the Hite and VanMeter families, who also supported the Patriot cause.[5] Because of the complexity of the conveyances of Fairfax land prior to the acquisition, litigation was bound to arise, even in the absence of questions arising under the Peace Treaty.

Shortly after Lord Fairfax's death, the new Virginia legislature passed laws affecting his claims, and soon began sequestering quitrents stemming from the developed lands, and tried to settle the manor and undeveloped land controversies by confiscating lands because of his heir's presumed Loyalist sympathies. It relied on a common law rule that aliens could not inherit land, which would then escheat to the state. Virginia officials secured the Proprietary's land office books in 1785, and the following year under governor Patrick Henry began selling them to settlers.[6]

While a young attorney, John Marshall represented Denny Martin Fairfax, and won a favorable decision from a Virginia court in

Panic of 1797. Meanwhile, various county attorneys in Virginia pursued escheat actions against Fairfax in their county courts, and Virginia's legislature also reflected anti-British sentiments encouraging more actions. In 1794, the Frederick County judgment favoring the Commonwealth was quashed on a technicality, but separate Shenandoah and Fauquier County juries decided in the Commonwealth's favor.[11][12]

Litigation background

The litigation began in the Virginia District Court at

Virginia Supreme Court), but because Marshall had resigned as Attorney General, and Patrick Henry refused the case, the state hired John Wickham and Alexander Campbell, but the latter committed suicide by laudanum overdose before the appeal could be argued, further delaying matters.[14]

Meanwhile, in 1795, Marshall filed a different (but related) lawsuit against David Hunter in the (new) United States Circuit Court. David Hunter had previously purchased a 788-acre parcel from the state of Virginia, then leased it to another man. Justice James Wilson and Judge Cyrus Griffin ruled in Fairfax's favor, but that case would not reach the U.S. Supreme Court until 1816.[15][16]

The Marshalls were interested in getting good (saleable) title to the 215,000 acres that Fairfax owned personally, and the State of Virginia wanted to be able to resell approximately two million acres of still undeveloped land involved in the original royal grant.[17] On December 10, 1796 the Virginia House of Delegates, with John Marshall as a member and Robert Andrews of Williamsburg advocating on behalf of those who held Fairfax land under conveyances from the state, passed compromise legislation. Robert Morris had suggested that legislation would help obtain loans from foreign sources. What was actually agreed to in the compromise was itself open to dispute, probably that upon obtaining the loan (and thus fulfilling the deal with Martin), the Marshall interests would retain interest in the 215,000 acres and convey the rest to the state. John Marshall seems to have believed in those years (the late 1790s) that the family was on legally solid ground based on the Treaty of Paris issue argued in the federal case.[18]

The Marshall group finally consummated the deal with Denny Martin Fairfax on October 16, 1806, and after various exchanges with James Marshall and Rawleigh Colston, Marshall secured 50,000 acres of prime Virginia real estate.[19]

Case

The case reached the Supreme Court on "a writ of error to the Court of Appeals of Virginia (the original name of the Supreme Court of Virginia) in an action of ejectment involving the construction of the treaties between Great Britain and the United States, the judgment of the Court of Appeals being against the right claimed under those treaties."[20] Because John Marshall had an interest in the proceeding, he recused himself.

Justice

federal courts could be effectively blocked, by a state court's decision, from addressing a federal question— in this case a British national's rights under the treaties with Britain.[22]
The history of litigation prior to reaching the Supreme Court suggests that there was much for the Court to look into.

Justice Johnson dissented, arguing that the Virginia legislature acted within its rightful authority, when the Fairfax lands were sequestered without certain established procedures being followed.[23]

Aftermath

After the U.S. Supreme Court decided that the Virginia Court of Appeals was mistaken in denying the validity of the Fairfax land titles, the Virginia Court rejected the U.S. Supreme Court's mandate. Martin v. Hunter's Lessee then came forward under a writ of error. Fairfax's Devisee is, however, significant in its own right.

See also

References

  1. ^ Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee, 11 U.S. (7 Cranch) 603 (1813).
  2. ^ Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 14 U.S. (1 Wheat.) 304 (1816).
  3. ^ William Thomas Doherty, Berkeley County, U.S.A.: A Bicentennial History of a Virginia and West Virginia County, 1772-1972 (McClain Printing Company, Parsons W.Va. 1972) pp. 15-21
  4. OCLC 1204336761
    .
  5. ^ Doherty
  6. ^ Marshall Papers Vol. II, p. 141
  7. ^ Smith, p. 164
  8. ^ According to Smith p. 101, another shareholder was John Ambler, possibly the richest man in Virginia after inheriting Jamestown Island, and who briefly served as a delegate for James City County as well as married Lucy Marshall, sister of James and John.
  9. ^ Smith pp. 163-166
  10. ^ Marshall papers p. 144
  11. ^ Smith p. 165
  12. ^ Marshall papers Vol. II, p. 143
  13. ^ Smith p. 165
  14. ^ Smith p. 166
  15. ^ Smith pp. 166-167, 580 n.134 noting that the pleadings used elaborate fictional titles which were abolished in a statutory revision in 1849.
  16. ^ Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 14 U.S. 304, 356 relates some of this.
  17. ^ Smith p. 167
  18. ^ William Crosskey, Politics and the Constitution in the History of the United States, (University of Chicago Press 1953) pp.785–790
  19. ^ Smith p. 168
  20. ^ Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee, 11 U.S. at 604.
  21. ^ Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee, 11 U.S. at 625–628.
  22. ^ Haskins and Johnson, Foundations of Power, vol. 2, Oliver Wendell Holmes Devise, 597–599
  23. ^ Fairfax's Devisee v. Hunter's Lessee, 11 U.S. at 628–632.

External links

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