Kolb v. Swann

Stone, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. In the case of Trimble vs. The African Methodist Bethel Church of Baltimore City, decided by this Court at the January Term, 1887, the question, and indeed the only question involved, was the title of that ehurch to a lot of' about two acres of land sold to it by Robert Oliver for a. grave yard. The land was purchased in 1820, and used as a burying ground for some sixty years or more, and until the City of Baltimore, having opened streets through-the lot, it could no longer be used for that purpose. The church then proceeded to divide this land into small lots- and sell them for building purposes.

The Trimbles, the appellants in the case referred to, purchased one or more-of these building lots, but having- some doubts whether the African Church had a good and merchantable title to-what, for the sake of brevity, we may term the grave yard lot, brought- the question to this Court upon a case stated. The question and the only question involved in that suit,, was whether the African Church had a good fee simple-title to the whole of that grave yard lot ? The church held the whole grave yard lot under the same conveyance and! ⁵¹⁹ by the same title, so that a decision that the church held the title to any part of the grave yard lot, necessarily implied a title to the whole. No pretence was made that any part of the lot was held under any different title or claim, except that which applied to the whole; on the contrary it was shown in that case that the title to the whole lot was an indivisible one, arising from the same source and depending upon the identical same title papers.

Upon the case so brought before this Court we held (by an equally divided Court,) that the African Church had a good and merchantable title to the lot it had sold to the Trimbles, and in so deciding we necessarily decided that the African Church had a good and merchantable title to the whole of the grave yard lot. Some time subsequent to that decision, Swann, the appellee, became the purchaser of one of the building lots carved out of the grave yard lot, and bargained to lease the same to the appellant, Kolb; but Kolb still having some doubts as to the title of the church, (owing, we suppose, to the fact that the former decision was made by an equally divided Court, and without an opinion being filed,) refused to comply with his bargain, and therefore the matter has been again brought before this Court. The facts in this case are precisely the same as in Trimble’s Gase, except that in Trimble’s Case the question was presented between the church and its immediate grantee, and in this the question comes up between a grantee of one of the building lots and his lessee. But the question is precisely the same, as there is no dispute or difficulty about the mesne conveyances from the church to the plaintiff in this case.

That part of the grave yard lot that was the subject of controversy in Trimble’s Gase is not the same part that is involved in this case, but each is a part of the original grave yard. It is apparent from this statement that this Court, having within a year, decided that the African Church had a good ⁵²⁰ and merchantable title to the whole of this grave yard lot, the question which first presents itself is, whether we should now re-examine that decision. We may concede for the sake of the argument, that technically and strictly speaking, this suit is not res judicata, because the parties are different, and the present parties should not he held conclusively bound by the decision in that case in which they had no opportunity to he heard. We may also concede that the judgment in that case is not what may properly be termed a judgment in rem and binding on the world; we may also further concede the power of the Court to reverse its own decision.

But notwithstanding all this, we think that both sound reason and the authority of adjudged cases, will amply justify us in a refusal to reopen this question of the title of the grave yard. As the difficulty seems to have arisen in the mind, of the appellee because Trimble’s Case was decided by an equally divided Court, we will first dispose of that question. The binding force and effect of a judgment of a Court of competent jurisdiction, and of all the legal consequenees