Hacklander v. Parker

• Decision Date: 13 January 1939
• Docket Number: 31800.
• Citation: 283 N.W. 406,204 Minn. 260
• Parties: HACKLANDER v. PARKER.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

283 N.W. 406

204 Minn. 260

HACKLANDER v. PARKER.

No. 31800.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

January 13, 1939

Appeal from District Court, Faribault County; Julius E. Haycraft Judge.

Action to determine boundary lines and to recover damages for trespass by Gladys Hacklander against Robert L. Parker. From an order denying defendant's motion for a new trial, the defendant appeals.

Reversed and new trial granted.

Syllabus by the Court .

1. A tax title is a new and original grant from the state as sovereign of title in fee, which is paramount as against the world and which supersedes and bars all other titles, claims and equities.

2. Mason Minn.St.1927, § 9187, does not permit a claimant of title to land by adverse possession in a boundary line dispute case to acquire title to the land by adverse possession as against a tax lien or tax title.

3. The action to determine boundaries, authorized by Mason Minn.St.1927, § 9590, is not merely to establish the boundary lines according to government survey, but also to determine the boundary line according to the respective existing rights of property of the parties.

Putnam 3 Carlson, of Blue Earth, for appellant.

Frundt & Morse, of Blue Earth, for respondent.

PETERSON, Justice.

This is an action to determine the boundary lines between the lands of the parties and to recover damages for trespass. Plaintiff has record title by warranty deed dated August 13 1936, to Lot 7 and the west one-half of Lot 8 in a certain block and addition in the city of Blue Earth, according to the plat thereof on file and of record. Defendant has record title to the east one-half of Lot 8 and property adjoining on the east. The boundary line in dispute is the line between the east one-half and the west one-half of Lot 8. Plaintiff claims title to the west 5.35 feet of the east one-half of Lot 8 by adverse possession thereof by her grantor and herself from 1911 to September, 1937, and that the boundary line between her and defendant's lands is on the east side of the 5.35 foot strip here in dispute. Plaintiff's possession was interrupted by defendant's taking possession of said strip of land in September, 1937, which she claims was a trespass and for which she seeks $50 damages.

Defendant claims title in fee by a tax deed obtained by him from the state on February 10, 1931, based on the 1920 taxes, for which the state recovered judgment upon which the land was bid in for the state at the May, 1922, tax sale, and the same having been forfeited to the state for nonpayment of taxes was sold to defendant at the annual forfeited tax sale in August, 1930. Defendant's land was described in the tax assessments, judgment, sale and tax deed as the east one-half of Lot 8 and tract adjoining, Block 1, etc., according to the plat thereof. No notice was taken in any of the tax proceedings or the tax deed of possession of the disputed 5.35 foot strip by plaintiff's grantor. Nor did he by his deed to plaintiff include the same as part of the land he conveyed.

Plaintiff claims that her title was perfected by the adverse possession of her grantor before defendant purchased at the tax sale and that defendant purchased subject to her grantor's rights. Defendant claims that his tax title is superior and paramount to any rights that plaintiff and her grantor may have acquired by adverse possession. She also claims that her grantor having located the lines so as to include the disputed strip in the tract which he conveyed to her, the line is to be taken as he located it without regard to any question as to the title of the land. The court found that plaintiff had good title to the disputed strip by adverse possession and that the defendant was guilty of trespass and ordered judgment establishing the line along the east side of the disputed 5.35 foot strip and awarded her $25 damages on accounts of the trespass. Defendant appeals from an order denying his motion for a new trial.

1. Plaintiff's grantor had been in possession of the strip of land in question nine years, from 1911 to 1920, when the lien of the state for the real estate taxes for the year 1920 attached. Taxes are a perpetual lien upon the real estate against which they are assessed, ‘ as against the estate, right, title, interest, claim, or lien of whatever nature, in law or equity, of every person, company, or corporation whatsoever’ (Mason Minn.St.1927, § 2117), until the taxes are paid. Id.§ 2191. The lien is continued by the judgment entered in the proceedings to enforce the payment of the taxes. Id.§ 2207. The judgment entered in 1922 preserved and carried forward the lien that accrued in 1920. Under Mason Minn.St.1927, § 9187, adverse possession can ripen into title only after it has continued for 15 years. But we do not regard that as important here. From 1920, any rights which plaintiff's grantory may have had by adverse possession were subject to the superior rights of the state under the tax lien, the enforcement of which would bar and cut off his rights absolutely. The tax lien was a warning that such a thing might happen. The purchaser at a tax sale derives his title not from the former owner of the land but from the state. A tax title is a new and original grant from the state as sovereign of title in fee, which is paramount as against the world and which supersedes and bars all other titles, claims and equities. Windom v....