Burnside v. Moore
Burnside v. Moore
Opinion of the Court
This is an action to determine adverse claims to three separate parcels of real estate. Plaintiff claims under tax titles; defendant under the original or patent title. Judgment was rendered in favor of defendant and plaintiff appealed therefrom. The three tracts of land in controversy were bid in for the state at the tax sale held on May 2, 1892, for the taxes of 1890. No redemption was made and the lands became forfeited to the state. Two of the tracts were sold to plaintiff on December 28, 1905, under the law providing for the sale of such forfeited lands. In connection with these sales, no
Plaintiff contends that this law, which provides: “The time for redemption from any tax sale, whether made to the state or to a private person, shall not expire until notice of expiration of redemption as provided in section 47, chapter 2, Laws of 1902, shall have been given,” does not require that the notice be in the form prescribed by section 47, chapter 2, p. 26, Laws of 1902, while defendant contends that it must substantially comply therewith. In Lawton v. Barker, 105 Minn. 102, 117 N. W. 249, it was held that a notice issued under said section 47 must give the information indicated by the form appended thereto. The statute above quoted requires the notice to be given as provided by that section, and, in the absence of any provision to the contrary, it necessarily follows that the notice must be a notice which is sufficient under that section. As the notices in question are subject to objections held fatal in Lawton v. Barker, supra, they are void and did not divest the owner of his title.
The third tract was sold to plaintiff on July 2, 1901, under and pursuant to the provisions of chapter 339, p. 557, Laws of 1901, providing for the sale of lands which had become and still remained the absolute property of the state, through judgments for “taxes of the year 1895 and prior years.” Thereafter, and before giving the notice of the expiration of the time for redemption, plaintiff paid delinquent taxes on the land for years subsequent to 1895. These subsequent delinquent taxes paid by plaintiff were not included in the notice, and the question presented is whether the notice is defective by reason of such omission.
It is to be noted at the outset that the sales provided for by the law in question rest upon the judgments previously entered under
Under the law as it stood prior to the enactment of chapter 339, p. 557, Laws of 1901, where forfeited lands were sold for less than the amount chargeable against them, the owner could redeem by paying the subsequent taxes with interest upon those delinquent and the amount with interest paid by the purchaser, although such amount was less than the amount of taxes thereby extinguished. State v. Johnson, 83 Minn. 496, 86 N. W. 610; State v. Butler, supra. Chapter 339 expressly changed the rule relating to the taxes included in the salé to.the purchaser, by requiring the owner, in order to redeem, to pay the full amount of such taxes, although the sale may have been made for less than that amount; but made no change in the requirement that in addition thereto he must also pay the subsequent taxes. This is apparent from the terms of the act. The manifest purpose was not to lessen but to increase the amount which the former law required the redemptioner to pay. It had long been the policy of the law to require the payment of subsequent
It is contended that plaintiff’s right to enforce his tax certificates against the land by the service of new notices is barred by chapter 271, p. 407, Laws of 1905. This law, as pointed out in Downing v. Lucy, 121 Minn. 301, 141 N. W. 183, is not of general application as a general statute of limitations, but “simply cuts off the right to perfect title by short foreclosure,” in the cases therein specified. This law, by its terms, confines the limitations therein enacted to certificates of “tax judgment sale issued to an actual purchaser,” and to state assignment certificates “issued under the provisions of section 1601 of the General Statutes of 1894,” and to notices of expiration of the time for redemption issued upon such certificates. It does not purport to apply to the certificates or deeds executed upon the sale of lands forfeited to the state. It fixes the time at which the limitation shall begin to run as “the date of the tax judgment sale,” pursuant to which the certificate was issued. As the notice of expiration of the period for redemption is not given, as to forfeited lands, until such lands are sold to an actual purchaser, it is apparent that this law could not well apply to such sales. If it were to apply to such sales, the right to perfect title,
For many years it has been the policy of the law to remove all limitations upon the right of the state to enforce the collection of its revenues, and, in accordance therewith, the legislature carefully restricted the limitations of chapter 271 to certificates issued to purchasers before the land became forfeited to the state, and to notices of expiration of the time for redemption issued thereon. The limitations imposed did not affect lands forfeited to the state, and, as to such lands, the time for giving notice of the expiration of the time for redemption remained unlimited.
The three tracts of land in controversy were bid in for the state at the tax sale of 1892, and had become forfeited to the state prior to the passage of chapter 2 of the Laws of 1902. They were sold to plaintiff before the Bevised Laws of 1905 went into effect. The provisions of chapter 2, Laws of 1902, did not apply to lands previously forfeited to the state, and plaintiff’s rights are measured and determined by the prior law. Stein v. Hanson, 99 Minn. 387, 109 N. W. 821; Byers v. Minnesota Commercial Loan Co. 118 Minn. 266, 267, 136 N. W. 880; Section 936, R. L. 1905, applies to lands previously forfeited to the state, as pointed out in Hage v. St. Paul Land & Mortgage Co. 107 Minn. 350, 120 N. W. 298, but that section has no bearing upon the case at bar, for the reason that the sale to plaintiff had been made before it went into effect.
Under the law governing his tax titles, plaintiff has the right to give a new and proper notice of the expiration of the time for redemption, and thereby perfect his title unless redemption be made. Byers v. Minnesota Commercial Loan Co. 118 Minn. 266, 267, 136 N. W. 880; Flanagan v. City of St. Paul, 65 Minn. 347, 68 N. W. 47; Berglund v. Graves, 72 Minn. 148, 75 N. W. 118;
Tbe printing of as for is in tbe printed form of the tax judgment is so obviously a typographical error that we think it should be disregarded.
Judgment reversed.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- I. T. BURNSIDE v. MARY E. MOORE
- Status
- Published