In re Barber

• Decision Date: 28 November 1883
• Citation: 17 N.W. 473,31 Minn. 256
• Parties: IN RE BARBER, TAX JUDGMENTS. IN RE SEDGEWICK, TAX JUDGMENTS.
• Court: Minnesota Supreme Court

31 Minn. 256

17 N.W. 473

IN RE BARBER, TAX JUDGMENTS.

IN RE SEDGEWICK, TAX JUDGMENTS.

Supreme Court of Minnesota.

Filed November 28, 1883.

Certified up from district court, Olmsted county.

F. B. Kellogg, for county attorney.

Lloyd Barber, for defendants.

GILFILLAN, C. J.

In the list of delinquent taxes filed with the clerk of the district court, Olmsted county, June 13, 1883, was a tract of the defendant Barber and also tracts of the defendant Sedgewick, and opposite each was stated the amount of tax and penalty for the year 1881. Opposite Barber's was also stated an amount for the tax and interest for the years 1871 and 1872, and opposite Sedgewick's an amount for the tax and interest for the year 1871. In the proceedings to enforce the payment of taxes against real estate, the list so filed is prima facie evidence that all the provisions of law in relation to the assessment and levy of the taxes appearing thereon have been complied with. Section 79, c. 11, Gen. St. 1878. This is so not only for the taxes becoming delinquent June 1st preceding the filing of the list, but for the taxes becoming delinquent in any prior year, when they are required by law to be inserted in the list. The statute requires such prior taxes to be, in certain cases, inserted in the list, and makes no rule in respect to the effect of the list as evidence as to them differing from that as to the taxes becoming delinquent in the current year.

The rule is general, applicable to all the taxes authorized to be placed upon, and placed upon, the list; and being only a rule of evidence, merely shifting the onus of proof, the legislature might apply it as well to past as to future taxes. But the cases in which taxes delinquent in prior years are required to be entered on the list being exceptional and the authority to enter them depending on exceptional circumstances, such authority must be shown by the state as a part of its case. Those facts being shown, the case of the state is prima facie made out, and an owner resisting enforcement of the taxes must then make out his defenses to them, either in whole or in part, which he may do by showing that there was no authority to levy them, or that the land is exempt, or the taxes have been paid, or that the special facts authorizing their insertion in the list did not exist, or any omissions prior to the filing of the list resulting to his prejudice.

In the case of Barber he alleges as defenses that he has paid the tax for the year 1881; that the land was not assessed by any person for the year 1870 or 1871, and no taxes were levied or assessed on it for the year 1871 or 1872; that June 15, 1872, the state assigned to one Elder its lien for the taxes, and also assigned to him its lien for taxes, June 15, 1873, the liens so assigned being for the identical taxes for 1871 and 1872 entered in the list; that Elder assigned the liens to Arbuckle and Arbuckle to one John Evans; and that afterwards, in an action by Barber against Evans, in which the latter sought to have the taxes adjudged a lien on the land, it was decreed that the taxes were void and not a lien; and claims that the questions litigated in that action cannot be litigated in these proceedings.

Sedgewick makes the same defenses as Barber, and this in addition: That in 1880 he purchased the real estate of which he is owner from Barber; that upon the deed from Barber the auditor of the county, on its being presented to him for his indorsement, indorsed “taxes paid and transfer entered;” and that he, Sedgewick, purchased the land relying on that certificate.

On the trials the state proved that the tax sales for the prior years mentioned in the list were declared void, set aside, and annulled by the judgment of the district court of the county, and that the money paid by the holder of the certificate of sale, upon taking the assignment to him, was August 1, 1881, returned to him out of the county treasury on the order of the county auditor, and the alleged taxes as originally extended on the tax duplicate books, with accruing interest, penalties, and costs, entered in the delinquent list for 1881 with the taxes for that year.

The defendants proved that, before becoming delinquent, the tax in the list for 1881 was duly tendered to the treasurer of the county, and they paid this tax into court. They also introduced in evidence the judgment and judgment roll, set up in the answers, and the defendant Sedgewick introduced in evidence the deed from Barber and the indorsement of the county auditor, alleged in his answer. These items of evidence were duly objected to by the plaintiff, and the decision of the court admitting them duly excepted to.

The defendants insist that there was no authority to insert in the list the taxes for the years 1871 and 1872, because, as they argue, the tender of the tax for 1881 was equivalent to payment, and consequently it did not become delinquent, and that only where there are taxes becoming delinquent for the current year, may the auditor add taxes for prior years, refunded because of the tax sale having been declared void. Section 97, c. 11, Gen. St. 1878, as amended by section 19, c. 10, Laws 1881, reads: “When any tax sale is declared void by judgment of court, such judgment shall state for what reason such sale is annulled, and in all cases where any sale has been, or hereafter shall be, so set aside, the money paid by the purchaser at the sale, or by the assignee of the state, on taking the assignment certificate, and all subsequent taxes, penalties, and...