Turner v. People of State of New York

• Decision Date: 18 October 1897
• Docket Number: No. 41,41
• Citation: 18 S.Ct. 38,168 U.S. 90,42 L.Ed. 392
• Parties: TURNER v. PEOPLE OF STATE OF NEW YORK
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

168 U.S. 90

18 S.Ct. 38

42 L.Ed. 392

TURNER

v PEOPLE OF STATE OF NEW YORK.

No. 41.

October 18, 1897.

This was an action of replevin, brought April 11, 1887, in behalf of the state of New York, by the forest commissioners of the state, against Turner, in the supreme court of the county of Franklin, and state of New York, to recover a quantity of logs cut by him upon lands in that county, and within the forest preserve of the state, between September 1, 1886, and March 25, 1887. The answer denied the allegations of the complaint, and alleged that at the time mentioned therein the defendant was the owner and in possession of the lands.

The material facts of the case, as found by a referee, were as follows: On October 12, 1877, the lands, being then owned by one Norton, were sold by the comptroller of the state of New York for unpaid taxes of the years from 1866 to 1870, inclusive, and were bid in by the comptroller in behalf of the state, and conveyed by him to the state by deed dated June 9, 1881, and recorded June 8, 1882. The defendant, more than nine years after that sale, acquired Norton's title in the land. The land was wild forest land, uncultivated, unimproved, uninclosed, and with no dwelling house or other building thereon. Neither the state nor any officer thereof ever took actual possession of the land; and no part of it was in occupancy of any person on October 12, 1879, when the period of two years allowed by law for redemption from the comptroller's sale expired.

At the trial before the referee, the defendant, in order to prove the invalidity of the comptroller's deed by reason of illegality in the assessment sessment of the taxes for the years 1867 and 1870, offered to show that the oath of the assessors sessors to the assessment roll of 1867 was taken on August 10th, instead of on the third Tuesday of August, and that the assessors omitted to meet on the third Tuesday of August, 1870, to review their assessments for that year.

The plaintiff objected to the evidence as immaterial, because the comptroller's deed was made conclusive evidence of those matters by the statute of New York of 1885 (chapter 448), which is copied in the margin.¹ The defendant contended that this statute was invalid, as contrary to the first section of the fourteenth article of amendment to the constitution of the United States. But the referee sustained the plaintiff's objection to the evidence, and directed judgment for the plaintiff, which was accordingly rendered by the court, and affirmed by the court of appeals. 145 N. Y. 451, 40 N. E. 400. The defendant sued out this writ of error.

Frank E. Smith, for plaintiff in error.

T. E. Hancock and Wm. Henry Dennis, for the People of the State of New York.

Mr. Justice GRAY, after stating the case, delivered the opinion of the court.

On May 15, 1885, the legislature of New York, by the statute of 1885 (chapter 283), declared that all the lands then owned or thereafter acquired by the state of New York within in certain counties (one of which was Franklin county) should constitute and be known as the 'Forest Preserve'; and established a forest commission of three persons, styled 'Forest Commissioners,' to 'have the care, custody, control and superintendence of the forest preserve,' and 'to maintain and protect the forests now in the forest preserve, and to promote as far as practicable the further growth of forests thereon'; and authorized them to appoint a warden and other officers, and to exercise various powers to carry out its object.

At the date of the passage of that statute, the time allowed by law for the redemption of lands from sale by the comptroller for nonpayment of taxes was two years from the time of sale. St. N. Y. 1855, c. 427, § 50.

On June 9, 1885, the legislature of the state passed the statute of 1885 (chapter 448), to take immediate effect, which provided that all conveyances thereafter executed by the comptroller of lands in the same counties, sold by him for nonpayment of taxes, and having been recorded for two years in the clerk's office of the county in which the lands lay, should, 'six months after this act takes effect, be conclusive evidence that the sale and all proceedings prior thereto, from and including the assessment of the land, and all notices required by law to be given previous to the expiration of the two years allowed by law to redeem, were regular,' and as required by law; but that all such conveyances and the taxes and tax sales on which they were based should 'be subject to cancellation, as now provided by law, on a direct application to the comptroller, or an action brought before a competent court therefor, by reason of the legal payment of such taxes, or by reason of the levying or such taxes by a town or ward having no legal right to assess the land on which they are laid.'

The land now in question was sold by the comptroller to the state October 12, 1877. The time allowed by law for redeeming the land from that sale expired October 12, 1879. The comptroller's deed to the state was made June 9, 1881, and recorded June 8, 1882. It had, therefore, been on record for three years when the statute of June 9, 1885, was passed and took effect; and by the terms of this statute, on December 9, 1885, the comptroller's deed became conclusive evidence that there was no irregularity in the assessment of any of the taxes for nonpayment of which the land had been sold and conveyed to ...