Reid v. Federal Land Bank of New Orleans

• Decision Date: 29 May 1933
• Docket Number: 30671
• Citation: 166 Miss. 392,148 So. 392
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: REID v. FEDERAL LAND BANK OF NEW ORLEANS

148 So. 392

166 Miss. 392

REID v. FEDERAL LAND BANK OF NEW ORLEANS

No. 30671

Supreme Court of Mississippi

May 29, 1933

Division A

Suggestion Of Error Overruled, July 17, 1933.

APPEAL from chancery court of Pike county HON. R. W. CUTRER Chancellor.

Suit by the Federal Land Bank of New Orleans against E. W. Reid. From a decree for the plaintiff, defendant appeals. Affirmed.

Affirmed.

J. N. Ogden, of Magnolia, for appellant.

The question here presented is, should the chancery clerk, when his duty arose to give notice to redeem from tax sales held in 1929, have looked to sections 3021 to 3027 inclusive of chapter 276, Laws 1930 (brought forward in the Code of 1930 as sections 3257 to 3262 inclusive), or to chapter 241, Laws 1922, for his method of procedure.

The appellant takes the position that the law of 1930 was the proper law for the clerk to look to since that was the law in force at the time he was required to send notice and since the law of 1922 had, at that time, been repealed, and was, therefore, no longer of any force and effect.

As the appellee appears as a lienor of record more than seven years prior to the sale of the lands herein involved, it is not entitled to notice to redeem under the 1930 law, nor can it complain for the lack of said notice. Therefore, appellee's only hope lies in the law of 1922, the provisions of which would have included appellee. However, the law of 1922 had long since been repealed at the time when appellee would have same applied.

The rule that a repealed law is dead for all intents and purposes is one that needs no authority.

Rules governing tax redemptions may be changed by the Legislature after the tax sale.

State ex rel. National Bond & S. Co. v. Krahmer, 105 Minn. 422, 117 N.W. 780, 21, L.R.A. (N.S.) 157; Curtis v. Whitney et al., 13 Wall 68-72, 20, L.Ed. 513; 7 Roses Notes on United States Reports, 491, 495; Archambau v. Green, 21 Minn. 520.

The Legislature of 1930 passed a public statute that gave notice to everybody that thenceforth the clerk of the chancery court would not be required to examine his records farther back than six years from the date of a tax sale. The Federal Land Bank had notice of this public statute, presumably. It had notice that examinations would not be made thereafter far enough back to reach its long-term mortgage recorded in 1921. It still had the right to redeem. That right was not taken away. The time within which it was allowed to redeem was not in anywise shortened. It was given notice, however, that no examination that clerks would thereafter make would reach back to its 1921 recorded mortgage.

C. T. Gordon, of Liberty, for appellee.

The appellee under chapter 241, Laws of 1922, was entitled to the notice as provided for under section 2, wherein it says it shall be the duty of said clerk of chancery court to examine the record of deeds, mortgages, and deeds of trust in his office, for a period beginning January 1, 1915, to ascertain the names and addresses of all mortgagee, beneficiaries, and holders of vendor's liens of all land sold for taxes, and shall within the time fixed in section 1, of this act, send by registered mail to all such lienors so shown of record.

The appellee was entitled to this notice which was the law in effect at the time of the tax sale of the land to the state of Mississippi. To hold otherwise would be to impair the obligations of the contract.

Price v. Harley, 142 Miss. 684, 107 So. 673; Everett v. Williamson, 163 Miss. 848, 143 So. 690; 26 R. C. L., pages 431, 435, 26 R. C. L., par. 388, page 431; 44 L.R.A. (N.S.) 667; 26 R. C. L., par. 390, page 434.

Argued orally by J. N. Ogden, for appellant, and C. T. Gordon, for appellee.

OPINION

Smith, C. J.

The appellee exhibited an original bill against the appellant and others by which it seeks to foreclose a deed of trust it has on certain land and to cancel the appellant's claim to a part thereof as a cloud on its title thereto. The decree was in accord with the prayer of the bill.

The appellant's claim to the land arises as follows: The land was owned by Varnado, who gave the appellee a deed of trust thereon in December, 1921. Varnado agreed to pay all taxes that might thereafter be assessed against the land. He failed to pay the taxes on a part of the land for the year 1928, resulting in it being sold to the state therefor. Varnado failed to redeem it, and, after the expiration of two years from its sale, the clerk of the chancery court of the county in which the land is situated certified the sale to the state land commissioner, who thereafter conveyed it to the appellant.

Section 2, chapter 241, Laws 1922, which was in effect when this land was sold for taxes, provides: "It shall be the duty of said clerk of the chancery court to examine the records of deeds, mortgages and deeds of trust in his office for a period beginning January 1, 1915, to ascertain the names and addresses of all mortgagees, beneficiaries and holders of vendors' liens of all lands sold for taxes, and shall, within the time fixed in section 1 of this act ...