Cogel v. Raph

• Decision Date: 12 October 1877
• Parties: CHRISTOPHER COGEL <I>vs.</I> HENRY H. RAPH and Wife.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

24 Minn. 194

CHRISTOPHER COGELvs.

HENRY H. RAPH and Wife.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

October 12, 1877.

Ejectment, tried in the district court for Goodhue county, by Crosby, J., with a jury. Plaintiff introduced, among other instruments, a warranty deed from Hannah Grignon, the patentee, to Herbert and Finley. Defendant offered to prove that Hannah Grignon was only eighteen years old at the time she executed the deed in evidence, and that the same had been fraudulently substituted, at the time of execution, for another deed for other lands; that the said Hannah had died in ignorance of this fraud, while still an infant and unmarried; and that her father and sole heir, Paul Grignon, had subsequently conveyed the premises in question to the defendant Henry H. Raph, by quit-claim deed. Plaintiff objected to the offer, and the court sustained the objection. Defendant then offered in evidence the record of a tax deed from the auditor of Goodhue county, which was also objected to by the plaintiff, and the objection sustained by the court. Defendant thereupon offered in evidence the record of a warranty deed of the lands in question, from Paul Grignon and wife to one Bowles. Plaintiff objected, and the objection was sustained by the court. The jury, under the instruction of the court, rendered a verdict for the plaintiff. A motion for a new trial was subsequently denied, and judgment was thereafter entered upon the verdict. The defendants thereupon appealed from the judgment.

Colvill & Hoyt and J. W. Steel, for appellants.

Williston & Hall and J. C. McClure, for respondent.

CORNELL, J.

The deed from Hannah Grignon to Herbert and Finley was executed in this state, and the lands granted by it were situate therein. The question, then, concerning the legal capacity of the grantor to make it, so far as respects her age, must be determined by our laws, which expressly declare that "females of eighteen years shall be considered of full age for all purposes." Gen. St. c. 59, § 2. Being of that age at the time, the fact of infancy as a ground for attacking the validity of the conveyance is not presented.

Conceding the deed to have been procured through fraud and imposition, it was, nevertheless, effectual to pass her estate in the lands and to vest the legal title in her grantees. So long as it remained in them it was liable to be defeated, because of the fraud; but whenever any subsequent, innocent, bona fide purchaser for value acquired it, without notice, it thereupon became in his hands an indefeasible title and estate, unaffected with the vice of the original transfer. Somes v. Brewer, 2 Pick. 183 The offer, therefore, to impeach the deed was rightfully overruled, inasmuch as the plaintiff was not a privy to the fraud, and no attempt was made to charge him with any notice of its existence.

It does not appear that Paul Grignon was ever seized of any title or estate in the premises, and hence the record of the deed from him to Bowles was rightfully excluded.

The tax deed, the record of which was rejected, purports to have been made and executed by S. J. Willard, auditor of Goodhue county. It recites "that the auditor of the county of Goodhue, in the State of Minnesota, did, on the ninth day of January, in the year one thousand eight hundred and sixty-five, at, etc., in, etc., in conformity with all the requirements of the several acts in such case made and provided, expose to public sale all those certain tracts of land described as follows, to-wit: The northeast quarter of the southeast quarter for the sum of $8.82, [and certain other parcels for certain other sums described, and stated in like manner, all in certain sections, etc., as therein mentioned,] the said sums respectively being...