USA > Vermont > The Vermont lease lands > Part 11
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48. University of Vermont v. Ward, 104 Vt. 239 (1932).
49. An outstanding, but not unique, instance may be seen in the case of Keith v. Day, 15 Vt. 660 (1843) : in 1801 the University of Vermont made a dura- ble lease of the second division college lot in the Town of Barre to one Moses Rood, and in 1804 this lease was recorded in Barre. In 1805 Rood sold and con- veyed by deed part of the lot to one John Belding, which conveyance was duly recorded the same day. Belding made a legal deed of conveyance in 1806 to Ira Day; Day sold and conveyed to John Baker in 1806. In 1817 Baker sold and con- veyed to Joel Steele, who sold and conveyed to Chapin Keith in 1818. In 1831, Keith sold and conveyed two separate parts to John Moore, Jr., and Smith Sher- man respectively. In 1840 he sold and conveyed another part to William Bassett, and the following year a fourth parcel to Orasmus Walker, retaining a small por- tion for himself. All deeds from Moses Rood down to Keith were warranty deeds, with all the usual covenants of seizin and title, containing no allusion to rent or reservation about its payment. Moses Rood, however, paid the rent to the Uni- versity until his death in 1830. Thereafter no rent was paid until the University brought suit in ejectment in 1839.
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farm or woods land, and it is not infrequent that such a lot will become incorporated into a holding otherwise composed of normal taxable land, the separate identity of each portion becoming obscured. In view of the previously described administrative weaknesses of the several agencies responsible for the lands, such events occur without difficulty.
The importance of this inadequate procedure respecting convey- ance, as a factor in obscuring the lands, was stressed in conversations by several individuals acquainted with such matters. Mr. Harvey made much of it. He even went so far as to say that he had encountered in- stances in which land was paying neither taxes nor lease rent, the town assuming that lease rent was being paid, but the beneficiary being un- aware of the lot. Mr. Harry C. Shurtleff of Montpelier likewise was impressed with the problem. He was acquainted with it in two ways. For one, he was for many years the treasurer of the Trustees of the Washington County Grammar School and responsible for those lands. He, further, was an attorney, and his practice brought him various cases involving land title searching. Mr. Ellsworth B. Cornwall of Middlebury was at one time Chairman of the State Public Service Commission and for a long period of time before that did title searching in connection with federal farm loan activities, and he was most pronounced in his views.
Some correspondence is shown here as illustrating the fact of this condition and its results. These letters happen to be taken from the files of one of the grammar schools, but similar letters are to be found in the various other lease land categories. For obvious reasons, some of the identifying material is omitted here. Otherwise the letters are true re- productions as they were seen in the files.
August 8th 1922
Dear Sir :
Henry Webster sent me the enclosed bill and asked me to pay it and tell you that he sold his land to me three years ago. Please send me a receipt and transfer Henry Webster's name for mine.
Very truly yours,
Dear Mr
September 10, 1935
Replying to your letter of the 12th of August relative to lease land rent.
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We own the Dickinson place so-called and had supposed that all taxes were paid so we had settled with the tax collector of However it appears that we now owe $57.82 lease land on this property. We have already optioned this property to the government and we expect payment soon. We would prefer to take this money from the sale money when received and settle the account at that time, provided of course that this is in the near future.
As to the Beman Howe land rent we are not holding the bag (Thank God for one break).
We trust that this will work out to your full satisfaction.
Very truly50
The reply to the above letter is also worth presentation :
Sept. 11, 1935
Gentlemen :
RE : lease land rent. Dickinson Lot.
I have your letter of the 10th and in reply will say that it will be perfectly satisfactory if you pay the rent at the time you in- dicate.
The Town of has no authority to tax this land; although it may tax the buildings thereon. The land itself is subject to a perpetual rental in lieu of taxes. This was in the original grant.
If you are dealing with the government, you should have a clear understanding with them that you cannot give them a clear warranty deed and that you hold only a leasehold interest; and that this rent, both past and future, follows the land. Otherwise they might come back on you for breach of warranty.
Yours truly,
9/22/19
If we, as a company, or individually, owe anything for land rent we would appreciate your sending us an invoice giving all the de- tails about it so that we can locate the land as early as possible. We will then make up a record so that we wont have to ask you to do this hereafter. Acreage, location (exact), rent per year, what years covered, from whom acquired, etc., if possible. Your truly,51
50. This letter was from a bank, signed by the treasurer of that institution.
51. This letter was from a lumber company which became aware that it had acquired some lease land in a forest area purchased some time previously. Corre- spondence relative to the location of the lot continued over the years. In a reply to the lumber company in 1932 the grammar school treasurer wrote:
As to your inquiry relative to range and lot number, will say that all of the information that I have is contained in the treasurer's book which I received from my predecessor. In this the lot is described as 'Land in
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Another instance of this confusing condition was described by a member of the legislature and relates the situation in which a son found himself entangled : He had purchased a farm, with improvements, from a bank, which in turn had acquired the property by foreclosure. Part of the farm comprised some very poor land which he wished to be rid of. In the papers covering his dealing with the bank it was evident that part of the farm was lease land, but there was no indication as to which part was so sequestered. He finally went to the shire-town records, since his own town's records offered nothing, but could find no deeds or leases recorded by which to trace the property. As he saw it, if the poor acreage was lease land, he could simply cease paying lease-rent and allow the lease to be cancelled, but if the poor acreage was non- sequestered land, he would be required to pay his taxes to avoid sale of his farm by vendue, including taxes on the poor land. When all else had been fruitless, he went to the selectmen and requested that they survey the farm in order to identify the lease land acreage. This they refused on the grounds that the survey would cost more than the lease- rent. (It should be pointed out that this lease land was in one of the shares falling to the responsibility of the selectmen.) At about this time he entered the Army and, under the protection of the Soldiers and Sail- ors Relief Act, announced he would pay no more taxes or lease-rent until the identity of the lease land was established.
Careless use of terminology has added its bit to the gradual con- fusing of the lands. This must be regarded as a factor in itself, but should also be thought of as closely related to the preceding factor in its application. At the base of the problem of terminology is the fact discussed in Chapter I that no uniform term has been used to designate the lands which are the subject of this study. That in itself has meant a lack of clarity in thought and discussion of the lands, so that the actual nature and status of the lands is not properly understood or appre- ciated by many people, including those most closely involved. Largely for lack of a distinctive term, for example, church and college lands be- came confused, and this can lead to improper handling of such matters as taxation of them. To be specific, the law in Vermont exempts from
2nd Div. 110A.' there being no range or lot number given- and I gather that this is the 2nd division grammar school lot, wherever it is.
The latest correspondence seen was dated in 1938, and at that time no progress had been made in the correspondence. Inquiry of the treasurer elicited the informa- tion that nothing further had occurred. Either the lumber company had accepted defeat or had proceeded in other channels in an effort to identify the lot.
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taxation only that real estate owned by a church which is occupied by the house of worship and the parsonage.52 Through gift, or otherwise, churches have acquired various real estate holdings, including farm and forest properties, which are subject to taxation. Now, if one loosely thinks of and speaks in terms of church lands, it is not too difficult to see how, in the course of time and changing personnel, lease lands listed as church lots should come to bear a tax. The same is true with respect to college lands.53 On the other side of the picture, the lease lands at times bear an undue burden of antagonism. The tax payers of towns have been known to become concerned, to the point of strong emotion, over the amount of land sequestered from taxation. And it has happened that lease lands were regarded as representing the total of tax exempt acreage, whereas in reality other exemptions, such as the holdings of the federal government, were those creating the tax crisis in the town.54
Beyond this point, however, other loose practices of terminology have existed over a long time which have had a more direct influence. It long ago became quite normal and customary for tenants to speak of "own- ing" lease land. A companion practice has been to speak of "selling the land" rather than "selling the lease." And, oddly, the true owners of the land, the grantees, have subscribed to this and acquiesced in such usage of terms. The letters exhibited in the discussion of the preceding factor display this custom, and it is prevalent throughout the files which were examined. To use terms in this way over a long time is inevitably to influence the thinking involved, and it is not at all surprising to find farm families after a few generations firmly convinced that they own the land. Instances have even been found during this research in which the tenants speak of paying the tax to the grantee, rather than lease- rent.55
52. P. L., ch. 33, sec. 592.
53. On the matter of towns taxing lease lands, see University of Vermont v. Carter, 110 Vt. 206 (1939).
54. Mr. Harvey went so far as to say that he regarded loose language as constituting a large part of the problem of the lease lands, and Mr. Francis L. Bailey, Commissioner of Education, pointed out that the towns, in statistical re- ports to the department, say indiscriminately, "from glebe rents." For an example in which terminology is unclear even in a court report, see University of Vermont v. Carter, op. cit.
55. Another terminological practice should be noted as it has made for diffi- culty in administering lease lands. The general practice in Vermont is for farms, and other parcels, to carry the name of an individual or family. Thus, instead of lot and range numbers, records are apt simply to refer to a place as "the Dickin- son lot" or the "Graham farm." This custom prevails even in such records as those
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One final factor remains to be presented, which may be regarded as underlying, or opening the way to, several of the factors previously dis- cussed. This is the distinctive character, or temperament of the Ver- monters. As in any discussion of the character of people, exact definition is difficult, and explicit terms tend to elude the writer. And, as in any consideration of character, one finds it a composite of numerous lesser characteristics. These difficulties seem to be enhanced in any attempt to transmit to others the nature of Vermonters because it varies so widely from what is elsewhere typical of the twentieth century America, just as Calvin Coolidge could pass unnoticed in Vermont but was a continual enigma to the people of other sections. Despite the inherent difficulty, it is necessary to attempt an understanding because the influence of the typical Vermonter's temperament cannot be overemphasized in a study of the lease lands.
To begin with, it may be said to retain a definite flavor of the eight- eenth and nineteenth centuries, and this is easy to understand in view of the minimum degree to which the impact of the twentieth century has been felt in Vermont. The relative isolation, previously noted, persists to a considerable extent. Despite the fame of Vermont marble, granite and machine tools, the area is essentially without large industry-even the railroads are relatively small institutions and retain a "hometown" aura. It has remained overwhelmingly rural-a region of small farm- holdings and villages with few extremes of wealth. It has, in short, re- tained much of the "neighborliness" of early days in which folks knew each other well. Out of this one finds a laissez-faire, "live and let live" individualism flourishing and being nourished by a pronounced con- servatism which can proceed largely unaffected by the greater present ยท day stresses and strains experienced elsewhere. There is a tendency to assume the honesty of those with whom one deals. (This was remarked earlier in connection with the activities of boards of trustees.) There is a distinct reluctance toward initiating any action which will activate dis- cord, and particularly is there a reluctance to have any such discord publicly aired. There is what some would view as an element of shift- lessness, at least by modern standards of business efficiency, or what others would prefer to call an easy-goingness, a willingness to let well enough alone. These are the attributes of Vermonters with which we
of the S. P. G. land agents, the grammar school records, and so on. The result is, of course, that the identity of a lease lot is ultimately lost. No real description will exist thereafter.
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are particularly concerned in the study of the lands. A moment's thought will show one how such characteristics relate to several of the preceding conditions which have been included as factors adversely affecting status of the lands : amateur administration, carelessness with records, an inadequate procedure for conveyancing of land, indiscriminate termi- nology, even the early laxness in gaining control of the parcels of land.
More than these effects, however, the characteristics enumerated lead at times to what appears to be an unconcern for the potential in- come from the lands; in failure at times to exert a vigorous effort to gain control of lots or to identify them on the ground, even to a failure to require payment of rentals due. Indeed, the non-payment of rentals over a period of years may be regarded as one way in which individual lots have been lost sight of. The records show relatively few instances in which those administering the various lands have resorted to the courts for ejectment of unsatisfactory tenants, although the files carry many letters threatening such action, perhaps for years at a stretch. Nowhere did the writer find an orderly, systematic and complete cata- logue of the parcels of land pertaining to any given grantee. By this is meant those lots on which rental income is, or has been, received, with- out considering the granted shares which have not been taken up. In relatively few instances was it possible to locate a lease-form, either in the hands of tenants or grantees, except for very recent leases.
It is realized that such a condition of affairs may be difficult of comprehension for readers from sections of the country in which metes and bounds, and titles to real estate, are normally matters of intense and meticulous interest. And so, at the risk of seeming to multiply ex- amples, it is proposed to relate various situations and remarks which have come to the writer's attention, with the hope that they will collec- tively demonstrate some ways in which the Vermont character can affect the status of the lands. It should be borne in mind that the series here presented does not comprise isolated or unique instances, nor does it include all that were encountered. Rather, they have been selected to be representative of a general way of thought permeating the community.56
The agent for one of the grantees stated that he had recently dis- covered a share for his principal in a town in which there had been three
56. As the nature of these illustrations will indicate, it has been thought best not to include the names or other identifications of individuals concerned in a paper open to public inspection. The writer, however, has complete references for each case in his files.
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divisions of land. He thought he would go after those lots whenever he found the time for it. He was carrying the information only in his head, so the future of these lots depended on his memory of the case and on his continuing as agent until he had taken some action. In the meantime, the beneficiary is deprived of the income. Such procrastination is typical rather than unusual.
In another town it came to the notice of the agent of one group of lands that his share seemed to comprise six lots of approximately 100 acres each. He concluded that there must be some error as this was greatly in excess of the usual acreage per town and said as much to the town authorities. He believed that three such lots were proper. Instead of proceeding with a search of the records and an actual identification of lots, negotiations were conducted with the town authorities whereby he took three lots, with back rentals, and the selectmen took the other three. As a consequence of this procedure the correct status of these parcels of land is not at all determined, nor is it known whether his principal is deriving a just income from that town.
In one town the lots of one of the beneficiaries had not been known. The agent for this grantee became aware that the town charter allowed his principal a share, and he proceeded to identify the lots. Until then the tenants had assumed that they were in ownership of ordinary land and had been paying taxes thereon. Early in his operations it became evident that at least some of the tenants would become seriously dis- turbed to find that they lacked title to "their property." Rather than create an issue with them, the agent and the town selectmen agreed upon a plan whereby the tenants would be left in ignorance. They would con- tinue to pay taxes to the town, and the town would remit the amount of the taxes to the land agent. Several points may be noted from this incident. It is without doubt an illegal transaction on the part of the selectmen. It obscures the true total of the town's grand list and the total of taxes collected. It leaves these parcels of land presumably sub- ject to sale with warranty deed of ownership; whereas, they comprise land, the title to which cannot be cleared. It opens the way, in the future, to conditions like those described earlier.57 And, in the future when the present agent and selectmen are no longer on the scene, it leaves the way open for any number of possibilities to develop.
A study of the lease lots included in the area under the State For- estry Service indicated a lot for one of the grantees in a certain town
57. Supra, pp. 88-90.
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which, to the writer's remembrance, had not appeared in the records of the agent for that grantee. The agent was queried and stated firmly that he would not have a share in that town because it was not a Wentworth grant, but was of later vintage. This aroused the writer's curiosity, and it was followed up. The record in the Forester's office was correct. The town in question had been created from parts of three adjoining towns during one of the numerous adjustments of town lines. One of the ad- joining towns was a Wentworth grant, and the lot in question had been so located that it fell within the portion going into the newly created town. The agent, in assembling the land for his share in the Wentworth town failed to locate the lot and simply concluded that his share had been excluded from one land division. To round out the point of this case, it should be added that this agent is one who is particularly proud of his energy and diligence in locating land to which his principal is entitled. The Forestry Service, in turn, instead of contacting him, had simply remitted to the town authorities as they did for those lots to the revenue of which the town was entitled, assuming that the town would pass on the money.
One of the interviews during this research was with an important officer of one of the largest and best known business institutions in Ver- mont. The interview was had because it was thought possible that the concern might be lessee to lease lands, or mortgagee of tenants of lease lands and that the firm might thereby be in a position to offer useful information respecting such lands. This did not materialize, but dur- ing the course of the conversation it developed that the official himself, in company with two friends, had a lease lot with a lake on it, for fish- ing. For our purposes, the interesting aspect is that, despite his promi- nence as a business man in a field of business much concerned with property, he did not know what beneficiary the land pertained to nor the terms of the lease. He simply accepted a statement of the annual lease rental as he was informed previous tenants had paid. He said he thought he might look it up sometime just for the interest of it. He "hadn't thought of this before." This is typical of the casual way in which these parcels of land are held.
The treasurer of one board of trustees told the writer that in one of the cities his principal had had four lots which paid a total annual rental of $65.00. These were occupied by ten tenants. In order to simplify the treasurer's bookkeeping one tenant had received the varying payments from the several tenants and in turn remitted the total to the treasurer.
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This intermediary died, and several years went by with no rental pay- ments being made. The treasurer then wrote a circular letter to the tenants requesting them to select a new intermediary. Nothing hap- pened. Still later the trustees arranged with a bank to do the collecting. The treasurer of the board, who had been concerned in all of this, told the writer that he has discovered that three of the lots are now paying the $65.00 and the fourth lot, through an error of the town listing, has become taxed property, and he supposes taxes are being collected on it. He said that he does not care about that so long as he gets his full rent from the remaining lands. The circular letter to the tenants also pro- vides an illuminating point in its last paragraph, herewith quoted :
I would suggest that you get together and fix this matter up and appoint some agent to do the collecting formerly done by Mr. . He formerly collected $79.47 for this land, paying me $63.60, himself $4.00 and his wife $11.87. I do not know why he paid something to his wife.
This treasurer is a prominent and successful attorney of many years standing and takes an active part in civic affairs.
Sub-leasing figured in an incident involving another beneficiary. The land in question was leased to a woman at an annual rental of $40.00. She had made several sub-leases of parts of the parcel. Under the policy then followed by this land agency, she collected from the several sub-lessees and made a single remittance to the agent. Then a period of ten years passed during which no rent money was received, and the woman made the plea that she could not raise the amount. It was then discovered that she had regularly been collecting from the sub- lessees and keeping the money. Now the agent collects directly from the sub-lessees.
Besides illustrating the generally slack business methods practiced, the two accounts just related serve to illustrate the assertion that there is not apt to be a heavy pressure for collection of rents, nor toward ac- tions of ejectment. In neither instance was there any action on the part of the respective agents toward ending the lease-contract.
In one town, the writer was informed that "there is quite a situation here respecting certain lots because someone made off with the records, and there is a question as to whether whoever did it is still collecting the rents."
One of the county grammar schools, which still exists as a land- holding board of trustees, but conducts no school, provided two inter-
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