David Josiah Brewer

“ But it contains no prohibition of retrospective legislation as such, and therefore now, as before, the mere fact that a statute is retroactive in its operation does not make it repugnant to the Federal Constitution.
As the state may, in the first instance, enact that taxes shall bear interest from the time they become due, so, without conflicting with any provision of the Federal Constitution, it may in like manner provide that taxes which have already become delinquent shall bear interest from the time the delinquency commenced. ”

“ Indeed, generally speaking, a party has no vested right in a mere matter of remedy; that is subject to legislative change. And a new remedy may be resorted to unless in some of its special provisions a constitutional right of the debtor or obligor is infringed. ”

“ There is no pretense that the taxes levied for these several years were invalid, or that the proceedings up to and including the collector's sale were irregular. On the contrary, the delinquent tax record in evidence, duly certified and filed, which by § 3 of the act is made prima facie evidence of the regularity of all prior proceedings and also that the amount of the tax against any real estate is a true and correct charge, showed taxes due as found by the court. ”