Jasper Co. v. Mickey

• Decision Date: 16 May 1887
• Citation: 4 S.W. 424
• Parties: JASPER CO. v. MICKEY.
• Court: Missouri Supreme Court

4 S.W. 424

JASPER CO. v. MICKEY.

Supreme Court of Missouri.

May 16, 1887.

1. SWAMP LANDS — CONFIRMATION TO STATE — IMPEACHING.

Where swamp land in Missouri is confirmed to the state by the report of the United States secretary of interior, and a patent for the same is issued from the state to a county in it, the county is invested with a complete title, behind which the defendant, in ejectment by the county for the land, cannot go, and show, by parol or otherwise, that the land in fact was not swamp land, and that the secretary of the interior made a mistake in confirming the selection of the same as swamp land.

2. SAME — PATENT — EVIDENCE.

Such evidence is inadmissible also under Rev. St. Mo. 1879, § 6204, art. 3, c. 122, relating to "swamp lands," and providing that all patents issued, as required by that act, shall be received and read as evidence in all courts in the state as prima facie evidence of title in the counties where overflowed or swamp land lies.

3. SAME — VENDOR'S LIEN — TAX TITLE.

A judgment foreclosing the vendor's lien retained by a county upon swamp lands sold by it, filed before the rendition of a judgment in favor of the state, in a suit by it to enforce its lien for taxes upon the same lands, passes to the county whatever equitable interest the purchaser from the county had in the lands, and gives it a better title — the county not being a party to the suit by the state — than the purchaser at the tax sale took therefrom.

4. ESTOPPEL — BY RECORD — EJECTMENT.

Where a county is not a party to a suit to foreclose the lien of the state for taxes on swamp land patented by it to the county, and by the county sold, with a reservation

of the title until the purchase money is paid in full, a decree in that suit works no estoppel, as against the county, to bring ejectment against the purchaser at the sale, where the price has not been paid in full. Neither the vendee of the county, nor the purchaser at the tax sale, takes, under such circumstances, more than a right to a deed.

5. JUDGMENTS — COLLATERAL ATTACK — PUBLICATION OF SUMMONS.

Under the Missouri practice, a notice in an order of publication, bearing date February 10, 1877, and notifying the defendants to appear at the next term of the court to be holden "at Carthage, in the county and state aforesaid, on the first Monday, A. D. 1877, and on or before the third day thereof," etc., should not be construed, for the purposes of collateral attack of the decree rendered...