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8 Cal. 165

Welch v. Sullivan

California Supreme Court

Decided July 1, 1857

California Supreme Court · decided 1857-07-01

Mary Welch brought this action of ejectment to recover possession of the undivided one-half of lots one hundred and forty and one hundred and forty-one, in the city of San Francisco, and for three thousand dollars damages, alleging that she was the owner of the undivided one-half thereof in common, and not jointly. The answer of the defendants consisted of— 1. A general denial. 2. Statute of Limitations. 3. The Settlers’ Act of 1856. 4. Outstanding title in Limantour. 5.

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1857-07-01

How this case has been cited

Cited by 14 later decisions (1 by the Supreme Court) — most recently April 1935

11 state decisions

40185718601870188018901900191019201930decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Terry, J.

¶1I concur in the judgment of affirmance in this case, for the reason that the principles involved in the case of Cohas v. Raisin, have been the rule of decision in this State for four 'years; that large investments have been made, and valuaable interests acquired upon the faith of that decision, and the *203effect of overruling it at this time would be to unsettle the title to a large portion of the most valuable real property in the State, and thus open the door to endless disputes and litigation. I think, therefore, that the opinion in that case should be regarded as a final settlement of the questions passed upon.

¶2It is urged by appellant that the same reasons existed for applying the rule of stare decisis to the case of Woodworth v. Fulton, which was overruled by Cohas v. Raisin, and that inasmuch as this Court has, in that and some other instances, departed from the rule, we should now proceed to determine the questions raised by the record in this case, as tjiough they were presented for the first time.

¶3To this proposition I cannot assent. I think in all eases of this nature, involving questions affecting the title to real estate, it is better that a uniform rule of decision should be established and adhered to; that the law of property should not be made to vary so as to conform to the individual opinions of each succeeding Judge or Court, nor the tenure of lands to depend upon the result of popular elections. Whatever views I may entertain as to the correctness of the conflicting opinions in Woodworth v. Fulton, and Cohas v. Raisin, considerations of public policy and justice, as well as regard for individual rights acquired under the law as announced by the highest judicial tribunal, imperatively demand of us a strict adherence to the doctrines of the latter case.

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