Youngblood v. United States

• Decision Date: 06 April 1944
• Docket Number: No. 9594.,9594.
• Citation: 141 F.2d 912
• Parties: YOUNGBLOOD v. UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Sixth Circuit

141 F.2d 912 (1944)

YOUNGBLOOD v. UNITED STATES.

No. 9594.

Circuit Court of Appeals, Sixth Circuit.

April 6, 1944.

Helen W. Miller, of Detroit, Mich. (William E. Dowling and Samuel Brezner, both of Detroit, Mich., on the brief), for appellant.

Newton K. Fox, of Washington, D. C. (Samuel O. Clark, Jr., Sewall Key, Wm. B. Waldo, all of Washington, D. C., and John C. Lehr and Arnold W. Lungerhausen, both of Detroit, Mich., on the brief), for appellee.

Before HICKS, MARTIN, and McALLISTER, Circuit Judges.

MARTIN, Circuit Judge.

The United States District Court for Eastern Michigan entered an order in the nature of a writ of mandamus, directing appellant Youngblood, individually and as Register of Deeds for Wayne County, Michigan, to accept and file notice of tax lien under internal revenue laws, when presented with a fifty-cent filing fee by the United States Collector of Internal Revenue, and to index the notice in a record book of United States tax liens. The entry of the order followed a hearing on the petition of the United States for an order to show cause. The basic facts are not disputed; but the legality of the order is challenged by the State of Michigan and defended by the United States of America.

Michigan says that the notice of lien, as presented, is not in a form authorized by its statutes for filing; and that its Register of Deeds, is, therefore, not authorized to accept and file the notice.

The United States concedes that the tax lien notice contains no description of the land of the delinquent taxpayer as directed by the Michigan statute, but insists that no such description is necessary. The Government points to Section 505 of the Revenue Act of 1942, Ch. 619, 56 Stat. 798, Sec. 3672(a), of the Internal Revenue Code, 26 U.S.C.A. Int.Rev.Code, § 3672(a), as the controlling law of the case. This section provides, inter alia, that a federal tax lien shall not be valid as against any mortgagee, pledgee, purchaser, or judgment creditor, until notice thereof has been filed by the collector in the office in which the filing of such notice is authorized by the law of the State or Territory in which the property subject to the lien is situated, whenever the State or Territory has by law authorized the filing of such notice in an office within its borders; and that, whenever a State or Territory has not by law authorized the filing of the notice in an office within its boundaries, the office of the Clerk of the United States District Court for the judicial district where is situated the property subject to the lien is to be substituted as the place for filing the notice.

The State of Michigan insists that, notwithstanding this federal statute, a register of deeds in Michigan is not permitted by state law to accept for filing a United States tax lien notice, unless it contains a description of the land upon which the lien is claimed. It is declared that, should the register do so, he would plainly violate his duty under Michigan Statutes Annotated, Vol. 6, Section 7.751, C.L. 29, Sec. 3746.

With respect to the pertinent point, this state statute authorizes the collector of internal revenue, or any other official collectors of taxes payable to the United States desiring to acquire a lien in favor of the United States, to file "a notice of lien, setting forth the name and the residence or business address of such taxpayer, the nature and the amount of such assessment, and a description of the land upon which a lien is claimed, in the office of the register of deeds in and for the county or counties in Michigan in which such property subject to such lien is situated; and such register of deeds shall, upon receiving a filing fee of fifty 50 cents for such notice, file and index the same in a separate book, entitled `Record of United States Tax Liens', indexing the same according to the name of such taxpayer as stated in the notice; all in pursuance of said section three thousand one hundred eighty-six 3186 of the revised statutes of the United States."

No ambiguity inheres in the Michigan statute. Its mandate that the notice of lien shall contain a description of the land is unmistakable; and the authority of the register of deeds, a ministerial officer, is clearly limited to the recordation of only such notices of United States tax liens as comply with the requirements of the statute.

With reference to certain requirements in other Michigan recordation statutes, the State Supreme Court has said: "These provisions are plain and unambiguous. If they are complied with the paper is entitled to be recorded. If they are not complied with the paper is not entitled to record." Nelson v. Scofield, 219 Mich. 595, 597, 189 N.W. 185.

The comment was made by Justice Cooley in Sinclair v. Slawson, 44 Mich. 123, 126, 6 N.W. 207, 208, 38 Am.Rep. 235, that "the doctrine that he who claims the benefit of the registry laws must bring himself within them is universally admitted." The record of an instrument not executed in conformity with the recording laws of Michigan is notice to no one. Galpin v. Abbott, 6 Mich. 17, 36. General recognition has been accorded the principle that an instrument which does not conform to the provisions of a recordation statute is not entitled to be recorded.

It could hardly be controverted that the authority of ministerial officers is to be strictly construed as including only such powers as are expressly conferred, or necessarily implied. In Van Husan v. Heames, 96 Mich. 504, 56 N.W. 22, the court held that, though the register of deeds is a constitutional officer, the conditions under which deeds are entitled to record rest entirely within the discretion of the legislature and are not to be invalidated for harshness. If a court should not invalidate a legislative act, certainly a ministerial officer should not do so.

The federal statute before us for interpretation prescribes that the collector of internal revenue shall file the lien notice in an office designated by state law. The Michigan legislature has denominated that office as the office of the register of deeds; but has conditioned acceptance for filing there upon the inclusion of a description of the land in the notice of lien for federal taxes.

This court affirmed 6 Cir., 116 F.2d 935, upon the grounds and for the reasons stated in the opinion of the District Court, the decree in United States v. Maniaci, 36 F. Supp. 293, declaring a federal income tax lien to be invalid as against a purchaser in good faith, where the lien notice, though filed with the register of deeds, did not describe the land as required by Act No. 104 of the Public Acts of Michigan for 1923, as amended by Act No. 13 for 1925, Sec. 3746 of the Compiled Laws of Michigan for 1929, supra. The court was then considering the effect of Section 3186 of the Revised Statutes of the United States as amended by the Act of May 29, 1928, Section 613, 45 Stat. 875, 26 U.S.C.A., Int.Rev.Acts, page 461, which provided for the filing of federal tax lien notices "in accordance with the law of the State * * * in which the property subject to the lien is situated, whenever the State or Territory has by law provided for the filing of such notice." The national legislation, Section 505 of the Revenue Act of 1942, supra, now under consideration changed the provision of the earlier Act with respect to filing a lien notice so as to require the notice to be filed "in the office in which the filing of such notice is authorized by the law of the State or Territory in which the property subject to...