Monday, April 29, 2013

Higday v. Nickolaus case brief

Higday v. Nickolaus case brief
469 S.W.2d 859

CASE SYNOPSIS: Appellant landowners challenged a judgment of the Circuit Court of Boone County (Missouri), which dismissed the landowners' petition for declaratory relief and injunction against respondent city. The landowners requested a judicial declaration of their rights to percolating waters under their lands and sought an injunction to prevent the city from infringing on those rights.

FACTS: The city sought to extract groundwater from wells to supply its growing population. The landowners, a group of farmers, filed a petition for declaratory judgment and injunction, requesting the trial court to declare their rights with respect to the percolating groundwater and to prevent the city from infringing on their rights. The trial court dismissed the petition.

ANALYSIS:
The court reversed and remanded, holding that the landowners stated a real controversy and that a declaratory judgment action was the proper method of obtaining relief in a suit to quiet title to water rights. Under the rule of reasonable use, an overlying owner such as the city could not withdraw percolating water and transport it for sale or other use away from the land from which it was taken if the result was to impair the supply of the adjoining landowners to their injury. The fundamental measure of the overlying owner's right to use groundwater was whether it was for purposes incident to the beneficial enjoyment of the land from which it was taken. The landowners' petition showed that the landowners were threatened with wrongful invasion of their water rights by the city and that the injury was irreparable.

CONCLUSION: The court reversed the trial court's judgment that dismissed the landowners' petition for declaratory relief and injunction against the city and remanded the cause for further proceedings.

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