# Eaton v. Town of Wells

> Supreme Judicial Court of Maine · October 20, 2000 · 760 A.2d 232

URL: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9643884

## Case

- **Full name:** Lisle A. EATON Et Al. v. TOWN OF WELLS Et Al.
- **Court:** Supreme Judicial Court of Maine
- **Decided:** October 20, 2000
- **Citations:** 760 A.2d 232; 2000 ME 176; 2000 Me. LEXIS 186
- **Precedential status:** Published
- **Opinion:** Concurrence by Saufley
- **Judges:** Wathen, Clifford, Rudman, Saufley, Alexander, Calkins
- **Cited by:** 36 later opinions in the Frix Law Library

## Citator (automated)

- No negative treatment found by the automated citator. That is not the same as a confirmation that the case is good law; read the citing cases.
- Full citator and citing cases: https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9643884

## How later opinions describe it (automated extraction)

- finding as compelling the testimony of residents regarding use of beach

## Opinion text

SAUFLEY, J.,
concurring.
[¶ 50] I concur in the result and in the reasoning of the Court. I write separately, however, because I would overrule Bell v. Town of Wells, 557 A.2d 168 (Me.1989).
[¶ 51] By our unduly narrow judicial construction of the time-honored public trust doctrine, our holding in Bell restricted the public’s right to peaceful enjoyment of one of this state’s major resources, the intertidal zones. Pursuant to our holding in Bell , a citizen of the state may walk along a *249 beach carrying a fishing rod or a gun 6 , but may not walk along that same beach empty-handed or carrying a surfboard. This interpretation of the public trust doctrine is clearly flawed. As the dissent so eloquently summed up, “the public’s right even to stroll upon the intertidal lands hangs by the slender thread of the shor-eowners’ consent.” Id. at 192 (Wathen, J., dissenting). I would conclude that the analysis of the Bell dissent constitutes the correct interpretation of the scope of the public trust in intertidal zones, see id. at 187-89 , and I would apply that analysis to the intertidal zone on the Eaton’s property.
[¶ 52] Although principles of stare decisis must be considered in determining whether we should give deference to the holding in Bell , the length and expense of the trial that bring the parties before us today speak eloquently of the need to address this issue immediately. As long as the public's legally cognizable interest in the intertidal zones remains artificially constricted by the holding in Bell , each time that the public and a private landowner clash over the scope of allowed recreational use of intertidal zones, the resolution will be uncertain. If such disputes reach litigation, the public will be required to prove actual historic use of the intertidal zone at issue for “recreational” purposes. In each case, the landowner will be forced to defend against the possibility of ever expanding prescriptive rights in the public: Moreover, such disputes are not likely to be rare. Maine has approximately 3480 miles (5600 kilometers) of coastline. 7 It is the longest coastline on the eastern seaboard of the United States. 8 The potential for multiple disputes, for continuing uncertainty, and for extensive litigation is obvious.
[¶ 53] Thus, we should acknowledge the problems created by our holding in Bell before landowners and the public are forced through years of uncertainty and unworkable restrictions founded upon a faulty legal analysis. Although it is the policy of the courts to abide by precedent and not to disturb a settled point, the doctrine of stare decisis does not require a “mechanical formula of adherence to the latest decision.” Adams v. Buffalo Forge Co., 443 A.2d 932, 935 (Me.1982) (citations omitted). Accordingly, in order to overturn Bell , the Court’s “unease with the analysis undertaken in that case must outweigh the compelling policy of following judicial precedent.” Shaw v. Jendzejec, 1998 ME 208, ¶ 8 , 717 A.2d 367, 370 .
[¶ 54] I would conclude that the judicial unease with the Bell analysis far outweighs the admittedly important policy of following precedent. 9 The rule in Bell is a re *250 cent creation of our own interpretation of an ambiguous term. In essence, we determined that the public did not historically own a right that was analogous to “recreation” as addressed in the Public Trust In Intertidal Land Act. 10 The Legislature has not taken any action in response to the Bell holding, that is, it has not revised the Public Trust In Intertidal Land Act to narrowly define “recreation” in the same manner that the Bell holding does. Thus, it has left the matter open for judicial correction. Furthermore, because the Bell opinion was rendered only eleven years ago, overturning that rule “will not do violence to a long line of authority, nor will it interfere with the reliance interests of these or other litigants.” Adams, 443 A.2d at 936 .
[¶ 55] In summary, common sense and sound judicial policy dictate that our holding in Bell should be overruled now, in order to preclude continuing uncertainty, expense, and disputes. Because I would overrule Bell , I would conclude that the public trust doctrine applies to the intertidal zone at issue here and that the Town’s prescriptive easement claim need only be addressed to the extent that it is asserted regarding the dry sand portion of the beach at issue.
. The carrying of a gun under these circumstances must be directly related to the activity of "fowling.”
. According to the Maine Department of Conservation’s Maine Geological Survey,
The coast of Maine has 5600 kilometers (3480 miles) of tidally-influenced shoreline and is the third longest in the United States. There are about 3500 islands included in the shoreline length. Mapping has estimated that about 2% of the coast (120 km or 75 miles) has beaches. About half of this distance is made up of sandy beaches and the other half is made up of coarser gravel and boulder beaches. The latter category is commonly pocket beaches, of which there are over 200 pocket barrier beaches that front coastal wetlands. Most large sandy beaches occur along the southern coast between Kittery and Cape Elizabeth, south of Portland. A few miles of sandy beaches also occur in midcoast Maine near the mouth of the Kennebec River.
Maine Department of Conservation, Maine Geological Survey, at http://www. state.me. us/doc/nrimc/ mgs/marine/ marine.htm.
. 1995 Almanac 495 (48th ed.1995).
. There are a number of guiding principles that are called into play when the Court is deciding whether stare decisis should be applied or avoided. A prior decision may be overruled when:
(1) the court is convinced that the rule of the prior decision operates harshly, unjustly and erratically to produce, in its case-by-case application, results that are not consonant with prevailing, well-established con *250 ceptions of fundamental fairness and rationally-based justice, (2) that conviction is buttressed by more than the commitment of the individual justices to their mere personal policy preferences, that is, by the substantial erosion of the concepts and authorities upon which the former rule is founded and that erosion is exemplified by disapproval of those conceptions and authorities in the better-considered recent cases and in authoritative scholarly writings, (3) the former rule is the creation of the court itself in the legitimate performance of its function in filling the interstices of statutory language by interpretation and construction of vague, indefinite and generic statutory terms, (4) the Legislature has not, subsequent to the court's articulation of the former rule, established by its own definitive and legitimate pronouncement either specific acceptance, rejection or revision of the former rule as articulated by the court, and (5) the court can avoid the most severe impact of an overruling decision upon reliance interests that may have come into being during the existence of the former rule by creatively shaping the temporal effect of the new rule articulated by the holding of the overruling case.
Shaw v. Jendzejec, 1998 ME 208, ¶ 9 , 717 A.2d 367, 371 (quoting Myrick v. James, 444 A.2d 987, 1000 (Me.1982)).
. 12 M.R.S.A. §§ 571-573 (1994).

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Source: Frix Law Library, https://www.frixlaw.com/law-library/cases/9643884. Public record. Not legal advice.