United States v. Vallejo (68 U.S. 658)

by Samuel Freeman Miller

United States Supreme Court

68 U.S. 658

United States  v.  Vallejo

THIS was a question of a survey of a California Mexican grant, of two leagues in quantity, to be located within a larger outboundary, and came by appeal from the District Court for the Southern District of California. The area of the larger tract was about three leagues and a third of a league. It resembled in shape a sack or purse, and the ranch was hence called the Bolsa or Sack de San Cayetano.

The United States, appellants in the case, objected to the survey upon two principal grounds; namely, that the two leagues of claimant were taken out of the central part of the sack, leaving to the government the remnant, in two detached corners; and because the land thus left was not equal in quality to that which the claimant got.

As regarded the first point, it was true that the land surveyed for the claimant was so taken out as to leave remnants; one of about three thousand five hundred acres, the other of about two thousand. As respected the quality of the land, the surveyor testified that the portion given to the claimant was of the average quality of the whole sack; parts were better for some purposes, parts worse. It appeared, however, that the land had been located as the claimant desired; that it was of a form sufficiently compact, and that, as surveyed, it embraced two 'old adobe houses,' inhabited now and for many years by the heirs of the original grantee, the present owners of the claim.

Mr. Wills, for the United States.

Mr. Justice MILLER delivered the opinion of the court.

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