City of Los Angeles v. Pacific Coast Steamship Co.

This action was brought by the plaintiff to quiet its title and right of possession to a tract of submerged land at San Pedro of which the defendant was in possession and was thereon maintaining a wharf under a franchise granted to it under the provisions of the Political Code.

The ease was submitted to the trial court upon a stipulation as to its facts, from which stipulation it appeared that the title which the city of Los Angeles had in and to said tract of submerged land was such as was conveyed to it by an act of the legislature approved May 1, 1911 (Stats. 1911, p. 1256), and that the only claim of title and right of possession of the Pacific Coast Steamship Company was that arising out of the franchise granted to it under the provisions of sections 2906-2920 of the Political Code. The trial court rendered its judgment in favor of the plaintiff upon these stipulated facts, and by such judgment it was decreed that plaintiff was the owner of said lands, and that all of the claims of the defendant thereto were invalid except that under the terms of its said franchise dated April 23, 1901, the defendant was entitled to the possession of said lands for a period of twenty years…