Jersey Farm Co. v. Atalanta Realty Co.

The plaintiff in this action sought to quiet its title to certain easements consisting of: 1. The right to maintain and use a reclamation levee erected and situated on the land of the defendant; 2. The right to have surface and seepage water flow through drainage canals situated on the land of the defendant; and, 3. The right to maintain and use a pumping plant, also situated on the land of the defendant.

Plaintiff’s cause of action proceeds entirely upon the theory that its right to the claimed easements had its source in their obvious and permanent user by the owner of the original tract upon which they were constructed and erected, and that upon the severance of the unity of title of the original tract such right by implication and operation of law vested in plaintiff’s predecessor in interest, and ultimately rested with the plaintiff.

The answer of the defendant, while denying the material allegations of plaintiff’s complaint, pleads the special defense of a release of the claimed easements solely as the result of a quitclaim deed made and executed after the severance of the unity of title by the owner of the dominant tenement, plaintiff's predecessor in interest, to the…