Vanderlinde v. Canfield
| Decision Date | 31 May 1889 |
| Citation | 40 Minn. 541 |
| Parties | WILLIAM VANDERLINDE and another <I>vs.</I> A. O. CANFIELD and others. |
| Court | Minnesota Supreme Court |
Action to determine adverse claims to unoccupied land in Wright county. Defence title in defendants under tax judgment, sale to the state, and assignment to defendants' grantor. At the trial, before Lochren, J., in June, 1888, the defendants introduced the tax judgment, entered August 10, 1874, in proceedings to enforce payment of real-estate taxes delinquent June 1, 1874, (which was objected to as incompetent for want of proof of jurisdiction to enter it,) and then offered the auditor's certificate, dated September 26, 1874, conveying the land to the state, and reciting that it had been bid in for the state for want of other bidders at the tax-judgment sale held on that day. To this the plaintiffs objected, on the ground that no proof had been made of authority to enter the judgment, but they admitted that the certificate was prima facie evidence of the regularity of the sale. The objection was thereupon overruled, and the certificate admitted. The defendants having proved an assignment by the state to their grantor, and conveyance from him to themselves, and that there had been no redemption, the court ordered judgment in their favor. On plaintiffs' motion a new trial was granted (on terms) for insufficiency of the certificate, the defect being an omission of the recital (Laws 1874, c. 1, § 124) that the land "was first offered to the bidder who would pay the amount for which the same was subject to be sold for the shortest term of years in said piece or parcel," the court holding that the certificate, though admitted in evidence, was void on its face, and hence insufficient to show title in the state or in defendants claiming under the state, and that the defect could not be cured by parol evidence nor by plaintiffs' admission. The defendants appeal from the order granting a new trial.
A. C. Brown, for appellants.
Joseph T. Avery, for respondents.
The plaintiffs were owners of the legal title of the premises, and still continue to be such, unless the defendants have acquired title through a state-assignment certificate issued under Laws 1874, c. 1, § 129, by the auditor of the county of Wright. The land was bid in for the state, and the principal question upon this appeal is the sufficiency of the certificate of sale issued to the state, and the effect of its admission in evidence. It was issued upon the sale for delinquent taxes levied in 1873, made August 10, 1874. The certificate is set out in full in the record, and the respondents claim that it is defective in matters of substance, and not in conformity with the statute then in force. Laws 1874, c. 1, § 124. The certificate required by that section is an essential muniment of title, and, in order to become operative as a conveyance, it is necessary that it should appear therefrom that the provisions of law in respect to the sale have been complied with, as recited in the statutory form. Philbrook v. Smith, supra, p. 100; Gilfillan v. Hobart, 35 Minn. 185, (28 N. W. Rep. 222.) It is made the evidence of the sale, and passes "to the purchaser or the state the estate therein expressed, without any other act or deed whatever." It depends for its force and validity upon the statute, and it...
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