Dissenting Opinion - REAVIS, J. [19 Wash. when the matter has been before the city council for action, a different intention has been expressed. Under the respondents' contention, if the city should never desire to assume the burden of laying out and maintaining Union street across the remaining part of the tide lands, the same would be useless to anybody, for the state could not convey a title thereto and the city would have no use for it. It is clear, it seems to us, that such was not the intention. Under the plat as laid out and thereafter corrected, every alternate street was extended across the tide lands to the harbor area and the others were terminated at Railroad avenue. The north half of said lot 7 lies between Railroad avenue and the harbor area. In making and correcting this plat it was doubtless understood to be for the best interests of the city not to extend all of its streets across the tide lands lying between Railroad avenue and the harbor area on account of the size of the blocks, and that it would better subserve the interests of commerce and the interests of its citizens and the public to extend only each alternate street beyond Railroad aveThe city had the opportunity of extending Union street at that time, if it so desired, without cost, and not having seen fit to exercise the right, the state had power to dispose of that part of it which would have been within the street if extended, and the relator obtained a good title. As that is conceded to be the only ground upon which the application for a lease was denied, the writ should issue. nue. ANDERS, GORDON and DUNBAR, JJ., concur. REAVIS, J. (dissenting).-I do not think the inconveniences of awaiting the prolongation of streets mentioned in the opinion will necessarily arise. In my judgment the protection of free ways to the harbor area for the public is more important than the mere private use of such portions of the tide lands as may fall within the prolongation of regular streets of municipalities across them. The constitution having made the grant of such easements without limitation of time in commencement of the user, I do not see very clearly the authority reposed in the court to assign such limitation. [No. 2991. Decided June 13, 1898.] THE STATE OF WASHINGTON, on the Relation of Bellingham Bay Improvement Company, Appellant, v. ROBERT BRIDGES, as Commissioner of Public Lands of the State of Washington, Respondent. TIDE LANDS-CONTRACT FOR PURCHASE-EXTENSION OF TIME-CONSTRUCTION OF STATUTE. Laws 1897, p. 229, §§ 27, 28 (Bal. Code, §§ 2157, 2158) authorizing the extension of all contracts issued by the state to purchasers of school or other lands," upon payment of delinquent and accruing interest, applies to contracts for tide lands as well as to those for granted lands, since § 5 (Bal. Code, § 2134) of the same act declares that "public lands" and 'state lands" shall be deemed synonymous, whenever used in the act, and that all sorts of granted lands, school lands, university lands, tide lands, shore lands and harbor areas are included in the term public lands." (GORDON, J., dissents.) Appeal from Superior Court, Thurston County.--Hon. BYRON MILLETT, Judge. Reversed. Struve, Allen, Hughes & McMicken, and Richard Winsor, for appellant. Thomas M. Vance, for respondent. Opinion of the Court-DUNbar, J. The opinion of the court was delivered by [19 Wash. DUNBAR, J.-This is a petition by the appellant to prohibit and restrain the commissioner of public lands of the state of Washington from canceling upon the public records of his office a certain contract between the state of Washington and the appellant for the purchase of certain tide lands. The petition sets forth the entering by the appellant into a contract with the state for the purchase of certain tide lands and the partial payment made thereon, sets forth the statute of the state of Washington approved March 16, 1897, being chapter 89, Laws 1897, p. 229, the notification by the commissioner of the delinquency in the matter of payment and interest, the payment of the interest by the petitioner in accordance with the provisions of the law and the refusal of the commissioner to accept the same, and the fact that said commissioner is threatening to declare the contract terminated and to declare the lands therein described forfeited to the state. The contention of the respondent is that §§ 27 and 28 of the law above noticed do not apply to tide lands, but apply only to the granted lands of the state. Section 27 (Bal. Code, § 2157) is as follows: "All contracts issued by the state of Washington to purchasers of school or other lands which are found to be delinquent in payment of interest two years from time of first payment, and which have not been extended by law, shall be declared forfeited by the commissioner of public lands unless such delinquent interest shall be paid to the state in accordance with notice hereinafter provided; that the commissioner of public lands shall notify the holder of such contract in each instance where payment of interest is overdue, and that unless payment is made within six months from the date of said notice, his contract will be canceled and the land shall revert to the state." Section 28 (Bal. Code, § 2158) is as follows: June, 1898.] Opinion of the Court-DUNBAR, J. "The time for making payment of principal on any of such contracts where one-tenth or more of the purchase price has been paid is hereby extended to January 1, 1905; Provided, That all delinquent interest due is paid as stated in section 27 of this act and all interest falling due on such contracts thereafter is paid annually on the dates stated in such contracts." It is also the contention of the appellant that the final provision of § 17 (Bal. Code, § 2147), which provides that "The commissioner of public lands may, as he deems advisable, extend the time for payment of principal and interest on the contract heretofore issued and contracts to be issued under this act," "All applies especially to tide land contracts. The rule of ejusdem generis is invoked by the respondent and the insistence is that as to the words of § 27, supra, viz., contracts issued by the state of Washington to purchasers of school or other lands," under such rule "other lands" necessarily means the same kind of lands as the kind expressed, viz., school lands, and that school lands being granted lands the provision "or other lands" must refer exclusively to other granted lands. Whatever construction, if any, can be placed on the last provision in § 17, an investigation of the whole act under consideration leads us to the conclusion that it was not the intention of the legislature to place the restriction contended for by the respondent upon the provisions of § 27. The plain provision is that the purchasers of school or other lands shall have the benefit of this law, and as throwing some light on the broader interpretation which we think was given to this language by the legislature, § 5 (Bal. Code, § 2134) provides that "All lands described in section four [and section four describes school lands, university lands, all sorts of 28-19 WASH. Opinion of the Court-Dunbar, J. [19 Wash. granted lands, tide lands, shore lands and harbor areas] are 'public lands' and the terms 'public lands' and 'state lands' shall be defined and deemed to be synonymous whenever either is used in this act." Hence we conclude that the words "other lands" might more reasonably be applied to the broader term "public lands" than to granted lands, they all being state lands. The evident intention of the legislature was the relief of purchasers of state lands and there would seem to be no good reason why the relief provided should be restricted to purchasers of only a portion of the state lands, and, in the absence of restrictive language on the part of the legislature, we must conclude that no such restrictions were intended. There can be no particular importance attached to the subdivisional heads in this bill, for the act itself is not consistent with such subdivisional heads in many instances. The first impression made by reading § 27, it seems to us, plainly would be that the words had reference to contracts in relation to all the public lands in the state. This seems to be as nearly in harmony with all the provisions of the act as would any other construction, and we do not think that the plain expressions of the legislature ought to be construed with reference to a technical rule of construction of whose existence the legislature was probably not aware, especially when its application would destroy another well settled and long established rule which is founded in equity and good conscience, viz., that forfeitures are not favored by the law, and that they will not be declared unless they are specifically and clearly provided for. The judgment will be reversed with instructions to the lower court to grant the writ prayed for. SCOTT, C. J., and ANDERS and REAVIS, JJ., concur. |