[ G.R. No. 911. March 12, 1903 ] 2 Phil. 24
[ G.R. No. 911. March 12, 1903 ]
MAXIMO CORTES, PLAINTIFF AND APPELLANT, VS. JOSE PALANCA YU-TIBO, DEFENDANT AND APPELLEE. D E C I S I O N
MAPA, J.:
This suit was brought to obtain an injunction, in accordance with the provisions of sections 162 to 172 of the Code of Civil Procedure, for the purpose of restraining the continuation of certain buildings commenced by the defendant. The court below issued a preliminary injunction during the trial, but, upon rendering final judgment, dissolved the injunction, with the costs against the plaintiff. The latter excepted to this judgment and assigns error.
In the trial the following facts were admitted without contradiction:
(1) That house No. 65 Calle Rosario, this city, property of the wife of the plaintiff, has certain windows therein, through which it receives light and air, said windows opening on the adjacent house, No. 63 of the same street; (2) that these windows have been in existence since the year 1843, and (3) that the defendant, the tenant of the said house No. 63, has commenced certain work with the view to raising the roof of the house in such a manner that one-half of one of the windows in said house No. 65 has been covered, thus depriving the building of a large part of the air and light formerly received through the window. In its decision the court below practically finds the preceding facts, and further finds that the plaintiff has not proven that he has, by any formal act, prohibited the owner of house No. 63 from making improvements of any kind therein at any time prior to the complaint.
The contention of the plaintiff is that by the constant ami uninterrupted use of the windows referred to above during a period of fifty-nine years he acquired by prescription an easement of light, in favor of the house No. 65, and as a. servitude upon house No. 63, and, consequently, has acquired the right to restrain the making of any improvements in the latter house which might in any manner be prejudicial to the enjoyment of the said easement. He contends that the easement of light is positive; and that Iherefore the period of possession for the purposes of the acquisition of a prescriptive title is to begin from the date on which ihe enjoyment of the same commenced, or, in other words, applying the doctrine to this case, from the time that said windows were opened with the knowledge of the owner of the house No. 63, and without opposition on his part.
The defendant, on the contrary, contends that the easement is negative1, and that therefore the time for the prescriptive acquisition thereof must begin from the date on which the owner of the dominant estate may have prohibited, by a formal act, the owner of the servient estate from doing something which would be lawful but for the existence1 of the easement. The court below in its decision held that the easement of light is negative, and this ruling has been assigned by the plaintiff as error to be corrected by this court. A building may receive light in various manners in the enjoyment of an easement of light, because the openings through which the light penetrates may be made in one’s own wall, in the wall of one’s neighbor, or in a party wall. The legal doctrine applicable in either one of these cases is different, owing to the fact that, although anyone ir open windows in his own wall, no one has a right to so in the wall of another without the consent of the owe and it is also necessary, in accordance with article 580 the Civil Cod*1, to obtain the consent of the other coow: when the opening is to be made in a party wall. This suit deals with the first case; that is, windows opened in a wall belonging to the wife of the plaintiff, and it is this phase of the easement which it is necessary to consider in this opinion.
When a person opens windows in his own building he does nothing more than exercise an act of ownership inherent in the right of property, which, under article 348 of the Civil Code, empowers him to deal with his property as he may see fit, with no limitations other than those established by law. By reason of the fact that such an act is performed wholly on a thing which is wholly the property of the one opening the window, it does not in itself establish any easement, because the property is used by its owner in the exercise of dominion, and not as the exercise of an easement: “For a man,” says law 13, title 31, third partida, “should not use that which belongs to him as if it iccre a service only, but as his own property” Coexistent with this right is the right of the owner of the adjacent property to cover up such windows by building on his own land or raising a Avail contiguously to the wall in which the windows are opened (art. 581 of the same Code), by virtue of the reciprocity of rights which should exist between abutting owners, and which would cease to exist if one could do what he pleased on his property and the other could not do the same on his. Hence it is that the use of the windows opened in a wall on one’s own property, in the absence of some covenant or express Agreement to the contrary, is regarded as an act of mere tolerance on the part of the owner of the abutting property (judgments of the supreme court of Spain of the 17th of May, 1876; 10th of May, 1884; 30th of May, 1890), and does not create any right to maintain the windows to the prejudice of the latter (judgment of the supreme court of Spain of the 13th of June, 1877). The mere toleration of such an act does not imply on the part of the abutting owner a waiver of his right to freely build upon his land as high as he may see fit, nor does it avail the owner of the windows for the effects of possession according to article 1942 of the Civil Code, because it is a mere possession at will. From all this it follows that the easement of light with respect to the openings made in one’s own edifice does not consist precisely in the fact of opening them or using them, inasmuch as they may be covered up at any time by the owner of the abutting property, and, as Manresa says in his commentaries on the Civil Code, “there is no true easement as long as the right to impede its use exists.” The easement really consists in prohibit ing or restraining the adjacent owner from doing anything which may tend to cut off or interrupt the light; in short, it is limited to the obligation of not impeding the light (ne luminibus officatur). The latter coincides in its effects, from this point of view, with the obligation of refraining from increasing the height of a building (altius non tollendi), which, although it constitutes a special easement, has for its object, at times, the prevention of any interruption of the light enjoyed by the adjacent owner.
It will be readily observed that the owner of. the servient estate subject to such an easement, is under no obligation whatsoever to allow anything to be done on his tenement, nor to do anything there himself, but is simply restrained from doing anything thereon which may tend to cut off the light from the dominant estate, which he would undoubtedly be entitled to do were it not for the existence of the easement. If, then, the first condition is that which is peculiar to positive easements., and the second condition? that which is peculiar to negative easements, according to the definition of article 533 of the Civil Code, it is our opinion that the easement of lights in the case of windows opened in one’s own wall is of a negative character, and, as such, can not be acquired by prescription under article 538 of the Civil Code, except by counting the time of possession from the date on which the owner of the dominant estate may, by a formal act, have prohibited the owner of the servient estate from doing something which it would be lawful for him to do were it not for the easement.
The supreme court of Spain, in its decisions upon this subject, has established these principles by a long line of cases. In its judgment of May 14, 1861, the said court holds that “the prescription of the easement of lights does not take place unless there has been some act of opposition on the part of the person attempting to acquire such a right against the person attempting to obstruct its enjoyment.” “The easements of light and view,” says the judgment of March 6, 1875, “because they are of a negative character, can not be acquired by a prescriptive title, even if continuous, or although they may have been used for more than twenty-eight years, if the indispensable requisite for prescription is absent, which is the prohibition, on the one part, and the consent on the other, of the freedom of the tenement which it is sought to charge with the easement.” In its judgment of June 13, 1877, it is also held that use does not confer the right to maintain lateral openings or windows in one’s own wall to the prejudice of the owner of the adjacent tenement, who, being entitled to make use of the soil and of the space above it, may, without restriction, build on his line or increase the height of existing buildings, unless he has been “forbidden to increase the height of his buildings and to thus cut off the light,” and such prohibition has been consented to and the. time fixed by law subsequently expired. The court also holds that it is error to give the mere existence or use of windows in a wall standing wholly on the land of one proprietor the creative force of a true easement, although they may have existed from time immemorial. Finally, the judgments of the 12th of November, 1889, and the 31st of May, 1890, hold that “as this supreme1 court has decided, openings made in walls standing wholly on the land of one proprietor and which overlook the land of another exist by mere tolerance in the absence of an agreement to the contrary, and can not be acquired by prescription, except by computing the time from the execution of some act of possession which tends to deprive the owner of the tenement affected of the right to build thereon.” Various other judgments might be cited, but we consider that those above mentioned are sufficient to demonstrate the uniformity of the decisions upon this point. It is true that the supreme court of Spain, in its decisions of February 7 and May 5, 1896, has classified as positive easements of lights which were the object of the suits in which these decisions were rendered in cassation, and from these it might be believed at first glance that the former holdings of the supreme court upon this subject had been overruled. Hut this is not so, as a matter of fact, inasmuch as there is no conflict between these decisions and the former decisions above cited.
In the first of the suits referred to, the question turned upon two houses which had formerly belonged to the same owner, who established a service of light on one of them for the benefit of the other. These properties were subsequently conveyed to two different persons, but at the time of the separation of the property nothing was said as to the discontinuance of the easement, nor were the windows which constituted the visible sign thereof removed. The new owner of the house subject to the easement endeavored to free it from the incumbrance, notwithstanding the fact that the easement had been in existence fov thirty-five years, and alleged that the owner of the dominant estate had not performed any act of opposition which might serve as a starting point for the acquisition of a prescriptive title. The supreme court, in deciding this case, on the 7th of February, 1896, held that the easement in this particular case was positive, because it con sisted in the active enjoyment of the light. This doctrine is doubtless based upon article 541. of the Code, which if of 1he. following tenor: “The existence of apparent sign of tin easement between two tenements, established bv tht. owner of both of them, shall be considered, should one hi sold, as a title for the active and passive continuance oi Ihe easement, unless, at the time of the division of the ownership of both tenements, the contrary should be ex pressed in the deed of conveyance of either of them, or sueli sign is taken away before the execution of such deed.”
The word “active” used in the decision quoted in classify ing the particular enjoyment of light referred to therein^ presupposes on the part of the owner of the dominant estate1 a right to such enjoyment arising, in the particular case passed upon by that decision, from the voluntary art of the original owner of the two houses, by which he iniposed upon one of them an easement for the benefit of the other. It is well known that easements are established, among other cases, by the will of the owners. (Article 536 of the Code.) It was an act which was, in fact, respected and acquiesced in by the new owner of the servient estate, since he purchased it without making any stipulation against the easement existing thereon, but, on the contrary, acquiesced in the continuance1 of the apparent sign thereof. As is stated in the decision itself, illt is a principle of law that upon a division of a tenement among various persons—in the absence of any mention in the contract of a mode of enjoyment different from that to which the former owner was accustomed—such easements as may be necessary for the continuation of such enjoyment are understood to subsist." It will be seen, then, that the phrase “active enjoyment” involves an idea directly opposed to the enjoyment which is the result of a men? tolerance on the part of the adjacent owner, and which, as it is not based upon an absolute, enforceable right, may be considered as of a merely passive character. Therefore, the decision in question is not in conflict with the former rulings of the supreme court of Spain upon the subject, inasmuch as it deals with an easement of light established by the owner of the servient estate, and which continued in force after the estate was sold, in accordance vrith the special provisions of article 541 of the Civil Code.
Nor is the other decision cited, of May 5, 1.890, in conflict with the doctrine above laid down, because i£ refers to windows opened in a party wall, and not in a wall the sole and exclusive property of the owner of the dominant tenement, as in the cases referred to by the other decisions, and as in the ease at bar. The reason for the difference of the doctrine in the one and the other case is that no part owner can, without the consent of the other, make in a party wall a window or opening of any kind, as provided by article 580 of the Civil Code. The very fact of making such openings in such a wall-might, therefore, be the basis for the acquisition of a prescriptive title without the necessity of any active opposition, because it always presupposes the express or implied consent of the other part owner of the Avail, which consent, in, turn, implies the voluntary waiver of the right of such part owner to oppose the making of such openings or windows in such a wall.
With respect to the provisions of law 15, title 31, third partida, which the appellant largely relied upon in his oral .argument before the court, far from being contrary to it, is entirely in accord with the doctrine of the decisions above referred to. This law provides that “if anyone shall open a window in the wall of his neighbor, through which the light enters his house,” by this sole fact he shall acquire a prescriptive? title to the easement of light, if the time fixed in the same law (ten years as to those in the country and twenty years as to absentees) expires without opposition on the part of the owner of the wall; but, with the exception of this case, that is to say, Avhen the windows are not opened in the wall of the neighbor the law referred to requires as a condition to the commencement of the running of the time for the prescriptive acquisition of the easement, that “the neighbor be prohibited from raising his house, and from thereby interrupting the light.” That is to say, he must be prohibited from exercising his right to build upon his land, and cover the window of the other. This prohibition, if consented to, serves as a starting point for the prescriptive acquisition of the easement. It is also an indispensable requisite, therefore, in accordance with the law of the partidas, above mentioned, that some act of opposition be performed, in order that an easement may be acquired with respect to openings made in one’s own wall.
For a proper understanding of this doctrine, it is well to hold in mind that the Code of the partidas, as well as the Roman law, clearly distinguishes two classes of easements with respect to the lights of houses, as may be seen in law 2 of title 31, of the third partida. One of them consists in “the right to pierce the wall of one’s neighbor to open a window through which the light may enter one’s house” (equivalent to the so-called easement of luminum of the Romans); the other is “the easement which one house enjoys over another, whereby the latter can not at any time be raised to a greater height than it had at the time the easement was established, to the end that the light be not interrupted.” (Ne luminibus officiatur.) For the prescriptive acquisition of the former the time must begin, as we have seen, from the opening of the window in the neighbor’s wall. As to the second, the time commences from the date on which he was “prevented from raising his house.” Some of the judgments which establish the doctrine above laid down were rendered by the supreme court of Spain interpreting and applying the above-cited law 15, title 31, partida 3, and therefore they can not in any sense be regarded as antagonistic to the law itself. The question as to whether the windows of the house of the plaintiff are, or are not, so-called regulation windows, we consider of but little importance in this case, both because the authority of the decisions of the law of the partidas, above cited, refers to all kinds of windows, and not to regulation windows solely, and because the record does not disclose, nor has the appellant even stated, the requirements as to such regulation windows under the law in operation prior to the Civil Code, which he asserts should be applied and on which he relies to demonstrate that he has acquired by prescription the easement in question. With respect to the watershed which, according to the plaintiff, exists over the window in question, the record does not disclose that the same has been destroyed by the defendant. He expressly denies it on page 7 of his brief, and affirms (p. 8) that the tenant of the appellant’s property himself removed it, by reason of the notice served on him; on the other hand, the judgment of the court below contains no findings with respect to this fact, nor does it disclose the former existence of any such watershed. Furthermore, the opinion which we have formed with respect to this matter, in so far as we are able to understand the merits of the case, is that this shed was a mere accessory of the window, apparently having no other purpose than that of protecting it against the inclemency of the weather; this being so, we are of opinion that it should follow the condition of the window itself, in accordance with the legal maxim that the accessory always follows the principal. The appellant contends that the shed should be regarded as a projection within the provisions of article 582 of the Code; but it is sufficient to observe that this article speaks of windows with direct views, balconies, or similar projections, in order to conclude that the article does not refer to such watersheds, which have not the slightest degree of similarity to balconies, nor are they constructed for the purpose of obtaining the view—this being the subject-matter which this article expressly purports to control—inasmuch as such sheds have rather the effect of limiting the scope of the view than of increasing it.
The fact that the defendant did not cover the windows of the other house adjacent to No. G3 at the time he covered the windows of the appellant, a fact which the latter adduces as proof of the recognition on the part of the former of the prescriptive acquisition of the easement of the light in favor of that house, which, according to his statement, is under precisely the same conditions as the house of the plaintiff, does not necessarily imply, in our opinion, any such recognition, as it might be the result of a mere tolerance on the part of the defendant. Certainly the fact of his tolerating the use by the owner of that house of such windows, supposing the facts to be as stated, does not carry with it as a result an obligation to exercise the same forbearance with respect to the plaintiff; but whatever may he the legal status of the windows in the house referred to with respect to the house No. 03, we can not pass upon the point, nor can we form suppositions concerning the matter for the purpose of drawing conclusions of any kind therefrom to support our opinion, for the simple reason that it is not a point at issue in this case, and more especially because the defendant not only denied the existence of the alleged easement of light in favor of the house referred to, but, on the contrary, he affirms that demand has been made that the windows in said house be closed, as may be seen on page 8 of his brief.
The point discussed in this trial being whether the plaintiff has acquired the easement which he seeks to enforce over the house of which the defendant is tenant, it is evident that the provisions of article 585 of the Civil Code can not be invoked without taking for granted the very point at issue. This article refers to cases in which, under any title, the right has been acquired to have direct views, balconies, or belvederes over contiguous property. The existence of such a right being the very point at issue, the supposition upon which the article rests is lacking,
and it is therefore nor. in point.
As a result of the opinion above expressed, we hold : 1. That the easement of light which is the object of this litigation is of a negative character, and therefore pertains to the class which can not be acquired by prescription as provided by article 538 of the Civil Code, except by counting the time of possession from the date on which the owner of the dominant estate has, in a formal manner, forbidden the owner of the servient estate to do an act which would be lawful were it not for the easement.
- That, in consequence thereof, the plaintiff, not having executed any formal act of opposition to the right of the owner of house No. 63 Calle Rosario (of which the defendant is tenant), to make therein improvements which might obstruct the light of house No. G5 of the same street, the property of the wife of the appellant, at any time prior to the complaint, as found by the court below in the judgment assigned as error, he has not acquired, nor could he acquire by prescription, such easement of light, no matter how long a time might have elapsed since the windows were opened in the wall of the said house No. 65, because the period which the law demands for such prescriptive acquisition could not have commenced to run, the act with which it must necessarily commence not having been performed.
Therefore, we affirm the judgment of the court below and condemn the appellant to the payment of all damages caused to the plaintiff, and to the payment of the costs of this appeal. So ordered.
Arellano, C. J., Cooper, Willard, and Ladd, JJ., concur.
Torres, J., did not sit in this case.