doubted rights, or which, in some cases, would compel him to recognize and satisfy demands upon his property which have been. created without his assent. In former times sumptuary laws were sometimes passed, and they were even deemed essential in republics to restrain the luxury so fatal to that species of government. But the ideas which suggested such laws are now exploded utterly, and no one would seriously attempt to justify them in the present age. The right of every man to do what he will with his own, not interfering with the reciprocal right of others, is accepted among the fundamentals of our law. The instances of attempt to interfere with it have not been numerous since the early colonial days. A notable instance of an attempt to substitute the legislative judgment for that of the proprietor, regarding the manner in which he should use and employ his property, may be mentioned. In the State of Kentucky an act was at one time passed to compel the owners of wild lands to make certain improvements upon them within a specified time, and declared them forfeited to the State in case the statute was not complied with. It would be difficult to frame, consistently with the general principles of free government, a plausible argument in support of such a statute. It was not an exercise of the right of eminent domain, for that appropriates property to some specific public use on making compensation. It was not taxation, for that is simply an apportionment of the burden of supporting the government. It was not a police regulation, for that could not go beyond preventing an improper use of the land with reference to the due exer- [* 386] cise of rights and enjoyment of legal privileges by others. It was purely and simply a law to forfeit a man's property, if he failed to improve it according to a standard which the legislature 1 Montesq. Sp. of the Laws, B. 7. Such laws, though common in some countries, have never been numerous in England. See references to the legislation of this character, 4 Bl. Com. 170. Some of these statutes prescribed the number of courses permissible at dinner or other meal, while others were directed to restraining extravagance in dress. See Hallam, Mid. Ages, c. 9, pt. II.; and as to Roman sumptuary laws, Encyc. Metrop. Vol. X. p. 110. Adam Smith said of such laws, "It is the highest impertinence and presumption in kings and ministers to pretend to watch over the economy of private people, and to restrain their expense, either by sumptuary laws, or by prohibiting the importation of foreign luxuries." Wealth of Nations, B. 2, c. 3. As to prohibitory liquor laws, see post, pp. *581-*584. had prescribed. To such a power, if possessed by the government, there could be no limit but the legislative discretion; and if defensible on principle, then a law which should authorize the officer to enter a man's dwelling and seize and confiscate his furniture if it fell below, or his food if it exceeded, an established legal standard, would be equally so. But in a free country such laws when mentioned are condemned instinctively.1 But cases may sometimes present themselves in which improvements actually made by one man upon the land of another, even though against the will of the owner, ought on grounds of strict equity to constitute a charge upon the land improved. If they have been made in good faith, and under a reasonable expectation on the part of the person making them, that he was to reap the benefit of them, and if the owner has stood by and suffered them to be made, but afterwards has recovered the land and appropriated the improvements, it would seem that there must exist against him at least a strong equitable claim for reimbursement of the expenditures made, and perhaps no sufficient reason why provision should not be made by law for their recovery. Accordingly in the several States statutes will be found which undertake to provide for these equitable claims. These statutes are commonly known as betterment laws; and as an illustration of the whole class, we give the substance of that adopted in Vermont. It provided that after recovery in ejectment, where he or those through whom he claimed had purchased or taken a lease of the land, supposing at the time that the title purchased was good, or the lease valid to convey and secure the title and interest therein expressed, the defendant should be entitled to recover of the plaintiff the full value of the improvements made by him or by those through whom he claimed, to be assessed by jury, and to be enforced against the land, and not otherwise. The value was ascertained by estimating the increased value of the land in consequence of the improvements, but the plaintiff at his election might have the value of the land without the improvements assessed, and the defendant should purchase the same at that price within four years, or lose the benefit of his claim for improvements. But the benefit of the law was not given [* 387] to one who had entered on land * by virtue of a contract 1 The Kentucky statute referred Gaines v. Buford, 1 Dana, 499. See to was declared unconstitutional in also Violett v. Violett, 2 Dana, 326. with the owner, unless it should appear that the owner had failed to fulfil such contract on his part.1 This statute, and similar ones which preceded it, have been adjudged constitutional by the Supreme Court of Vermont, and have frequently been enforced. In an early case the court explained the principle of these statutes as follows: "The action for betterments, as they are now termed in the statute, is given on the supposition that the legal title is found to be in the plaintiff in ejectment, and is intended to secure to the defendant the fruit of his labor, and to the plaintiff all that he is justly entitled to, which is his land in as good a situation as it would have been had no labor been bestowed thereon. The statute is highly equitable in all its provisions, and would do exact justice if the value either of the improvements or of the land was always correctly estimated. The principles upon which it is founded are taken from the civil law, where ample provision was made for reimbursing the bona fide possessor the expense of his improvements, if he was removed from his possession by the legal owner. It gives to the possessor not the expense which he has laid out on the land, but the amount which he has increased the value of the land by his betterments thereon; or, in other words, the difference between the value of the land as it is when the owner recovers it, and the value if no improvement had been made. If the owner takes the land together with the improvements, at the advanced value which it has from the labor of the possessor, what can be more just than that he should pay the difference? But if he is unwilling to pay this difference, by giving a deed as the statute provides, he receives the value as it would have been if nothing had been done thereon. The only objection which can be made is, that it is sometimes compelling the owner to sell when he may have been content with the property in its natural state. But this, when weighed against the loss to the bona fide possessor, and against the injustice of depriving him of the fruits of his labor, and giving it to another, who, by his negligence in not sooner enforcing his claim, has in some measure contributed to the mistake under which he has labored, is not entitled to very great consideration." 2 1 Revised Statutes of Vermont of class of legislation was also elabo1839, p. 216. rately examined and defended by 2 Brown v. Storm, 4 Vt. 37. This Trumbull, J., in Ross v. Irving, 14 Ill. [* 388] *The last circumstance stated in this opinion-the negligence of the owner in asserting his claim-is evidently deemed important in some States, whose statutes only allow a recovery for improvements by one who has been in possession a certain number of years. But a later Vermont case dismisses it from consideration as a necessary ground on which to base the right of recovery. "The right of the occupant to recover the value of his improvements," say the court, "does not depend upon the question whether the real owner has been vigilant or negligent in the assertion of his rights. It stands upon a principle of natural justice and equity; viz., that the occupant in good faith, believing himself to be the owner, has added to the permanent value of the land by his labor and his money; is in equity entitled to such added value; and that it would be unjust that the owner of the land should be enriched by acquiring the value of such improvements, without compensation to him who made them. This principle of natural justice has been very widely, we may say universally recognized." 1 171, and in some of the other cases referred to in the succeeding note. See also Bright v. Boyd, 1 Story, 478; s. c. 2 Story, 607. 1 Whitney v. Richardson, 31 Vt. 306. For other cases in which similar laws have been held constitutional, see Armstrong v. Jackson, 1 Blackf. 374; Fowler v. Halbert, 4 Bibb, 54; Withington v. Corey, 2 N. H. 115; Bacon V. Callender, 6 Mass. 303; Pacquette v. Pickness, 19 Wis. 219; Childs v. Shower, 18 Iowa, 261; Scott v. Mather, 14 Tex. 235; Saunders v. Wilson, 19 Tex. 194; Brackett v. Norcross, 1 Greenl. 92; Hunt's Lessee v. McMahan, 5 Ohio, 132; Longworth v. Worthington, 6 Ohio, 10. See further, Jones v. Carter, 12 Mass. 314; Coney v. Owen, 6 Watts, 435; Steele v. Spruance, 22 Penn. St. 256; Lynch v. Brudie, 63 Penn. St. 206; Dothage v. Stuart, 35 Mo. 251; Fenwick v. Gill, 38 Mo. 510; Howard v. Zeyer, 18 La. Ann. 407; Pope v. Macon, 23 Ark. 644; Marlow v. Adams, 24 Ark. 109; Ormond v. Martin, 37 Ala. 598; Love v. Shartzer, 31 Cal. 487. For a contrary ruling, see Nelson v. Allen, 1 v. Powell, 13 Betterment laws, then, recognize the existence of an [*389] equitable right, and give a remedy for its enforcement where none had existed before. It is true that they make a man pay for improvements which he has not directed to be made; but this legislation presents no feature of officious interference by the government with private property. The improvements have been made by one person in good faith, and are now to be appropriated by another. The parties cannot be placed in statu quo, and the statute accomplishes justice as nearly as the circumstances of the case will admit, when it compels the owner of the land, who, if he declines to sell, must necessarily appropriate the betterments made by another, to pay the value to the person at whose expense they have been made. The case is peculiar; but a statute cannot be void as an unconstitutional interference with private property which adjusts the equities of the parties as nearly as possible according to natural justice.1 Unequal and Partial Legislation. In the course of our discussion of this subject it has been seen that some statutes are void though general in their scope, while others are valid though establishing rules for single cases only. An enactment may therefore be the law of the land without being a general law. And this being so, it may be important to land, to demand payment from the successful claimant of the full value of his lasting and valuable improvements, or to pay to the successful claimant the value of the land without the improvements, and retain it. The court say: "The occupying claimant act, in securing to the occupant a compensation for his improvements as a condition precedent to the restitution of the lands to the owner, goes to the utmost stretch of the legislative power touching this subject. And the statute... providing for the transfer of the fee in the land to the occupying claimant, without the consent of the owner, is a palpable invasion of the right of private property, and clearly in conflict with the Constitution." 1 In Harris v. Inhabitants of Marblehead, 10 Gray, 44. it was held that the betterment law did not apply to a town which had appropriated private property for the purposes of a schoolhouse, and erected the house thereon. The law, it was said, did not apply "where a party is taking land by force of the statute, and is bound to see that all the steps are regular. If it did, the party taking the land might in fact compel a sale of the land, or compel the party to buy the schoolhouse, or any other building erected upon it." But as a matter of constitutional authority, we see no reason to doubt that the legislature might extend such a law even to the cases of this description. |