Coles v. Cnty. Com'rs of Wash. Co.

• Decision Date: 05 April 1886
• Citation: 35 Minn. 124,27 N.W. 497
• Parties: COLES v COUNTY COM'RS OF WASHINGTON CO.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

35 Minn. 124

27 N.W. 497

COLESvCOUNTY COM'RS OF WASHINGTON CO.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Filed April 5, 1886.

Appeal from an order of the district court, Washington county, sustaining demurrer.

GILFILLAN, C. J., dissents. Searles, Ewing & Gail, for appellant, Margaret Coles.

Ira W. Castle, for respondent, county of Washington.

VANDERBURGH, J.

The plaintiff purchased and received a deed of certain premises, being a block of land in the city of Stillwater. The title of her grantor was obtained under a foreclosure sale, which at the time of such purchase, though apparently valid and sufficient to pass the title, was in fact void on account of matter dehors the record, and entirely unknown to the plaintiff; and it appears to have been so adjudged. Coles v. Yorks, 28 Minn. 464;S. C. 10 N. W. Rep. 775. Before the discovery of the defect in her title, and while she, in good faith, believed herself the absolute owner of the property by virtue of the foreclosure proceedings, she ascertained that the premises were charged with a large amount of taxes for the years 1862 and 1880, and all intervening years, except the year 1873, amounting in all to upwards of $1,300, and which were at the time understood and believed by the plaintiff to be a valid lien upon the land. It having subsequently been found that the foreclosure was invalid and insufficient to pass the title, plaintiff procured a formal assignment of the original mortgage, and the indebtedness thereby secured, and thereupon proceeded to reforeclose the same by action, in which the plaintiff set up the fact of the payment of such taxes, and claimed to tack the amount thereof to the amount due upon the mortgage, and to enforce the lien thereof against the property. The block of land in question included the homestead premises of the mortgagors in respect to which the mortgage and original foreclosure were held invalid. A reforeclosure, therefore, became necessary. The court, upon issues joined and a trial thereon, adjudged the mortgage a lien upon the balance of the block after the homestead was set off, and ordered a foreclosure accordingly; but denied the plaintiff's claim for the taxes so paid, holding and determining that the plaintiff was not entitled to have such taxes adjudged a lien on the premises on the ground of irregularities and defects in the tax proceedings; and judgment was rendered in conformity with such findings.

By an act of the legislature approved March 9, 1885, it is provided and enacted as follows: “Whenever money has been paid, or hereafter shall be paid, for taxes on any land, by a person who holds a mortgage on such land, or who, in good faith, believes himself to be the owner of such land under a mortgage foreclosure, which foreclosure has been, or hereafter shall be, declared void, the money so paid, with interest from the date of such payment at the rate of seven per cent. per annum, shall be refunded to such person, his executors, administrators, or assigns, whenever such taxes have been, or hereafter shall be, adjudged void in an action for the foreclosure or reforeclosure of such mortgage.” Section 2 provides for the payment of the same by the county treasurer on the order of the county commissioners, and for a reassessment of such taxes upon the lands; and section 3 requires that the moneys so refunded shall be charged to the various taxing districts in the proportion shared by them in the amount originally paid.

And thereafter the plaintiff presented to the defendants, commissioners of Washington county, the proofs of her claim under the act just recited, including the proof of the payment of the taxes and record of the judgment denying her relief therefor against the land on the ground stated. Their refusal to allow such claim resulted in this action.

The plaintiff insists that this case falls within the provisions of the act in question. She also claims that, independently of the statute, she is entitled to recover for money had and received, which, under the circumstances, the defendants in equity and good conscience ought not to retain. But this statute provides for an apportionment of the burden of the reimbursement of such taxes, and for a reassessment. It is therefore important that it should be construed, and its effect and validity determined, as respects the rights of the county in the premises.

1. The statute as a remedial one, and by its terms, is intended to be retroactive. The language, as will be observed, is: “Whenever money has been paid, or hereafter shall be paid, for taxes,” etc.; and “whenever such taxes have been, or hereafter shall be, adjudged void,” etc. In this respect the language and purpose of the act resemble that construed by this court in State v. Cronkhite, 28 Minn. 198, 199; S. C. 9 N. W. Rep. 681.

2. No substantial objections can be urged against the constitutional right of the law-making power to enact statutes of this kind. It is a question of policy of the wisdom of which the legislatue is, within certain limits, exclusively to judge. In Town of Guilford v. Supervisors, 13 N. Y. 149, the court say: “The legislature is not confined in its appropriation of the public moneys, or of the sums to be raised by taxation in favor of individuals, to cases in which a legal demand exists against the state. It can thus recognize claims founded on justice and equity, in the largest sense of these terms.” Cooley, Const. Lim. *226, *230; Town of Guilford v. Supervisors, 18 Barb. 640. See Blanding v. Burr, 13 Cal. 351, and cases cited.

In State v. Cronkhite, supra, the statute under consideration related to the reimbursement of purchasers where tax sales are adjudged void, and it was there held that “where a tax sale has been declared void a moral obligation arises to refund the purchaser's money.” Such obligation is sufficient to support retroactive legislation. Indeed, the rule stated is specially applicable to such legislation because, as respects future transactions, purchases or payments must be presumed to have been made in reliance upon the conditions of the existing statutes. Fleming v. Roverud, 30 Minn. 275; S. C. 15 N. W. Rep. 119. But the class of cases provided for by the act in question presents as strong claims for legislative recognition as the case of purchasers at tax sales. It appears to be the policy of the state to encourage the payment of taxes by lienholders. Gen. St. c. 11, § 104. The mortgagee pays on the faith of securing a lien, just as the tax purchaser pays...