James Moore Wayne

“ Again, in Ronkendorff's Case, 4 Peters, 349, this court repeated that in an ex parte proceeding, as a sale of lands for taxes, under a special authority, great strictness is required. An individual cannot be divested of his property against his consent, until every substantial requisite of the law has been complied with. The proof of the regularity of the collector's proceedings devolves upon the person who claims under the collector's sale. ”

“ The authority of the officer to sell is, as it was in this case, 'unless the taxes be previously paid to the collector, with such expenses as may have accrued at the time of payment.' There is a difference, it is true, in the strictness required in a tax sale, and that of a sale made under judgment and execution, but in both, the same rule applies as to the full notice of time which the law requires to be given for the sale. 'In deciding upon tax land titles great strictness has always been observed. ”

“ When we say that any thing may be done in twelve weeks, or that it shall not be done for twelve weeks, after the happening of a fact which is to precede it, we mean that it may be done in twelve weeks or eighty-four days, or, as the case may be, that it shall not be done before. ”

“ A collector selling lands for taxes, must act in conformity with the law from which his power is derived; and the purchaser is bound to inquire whether he has so acted. It is incumbent upon the vendee to prove the authority to sell. ”

“ It is not enough to give twelve or more insertions of the advertisement. It may be continued twice or thrice a week, or even daily. In the early charters the corporation began simply with the period of notice: six weeks, three months, six months. Weekly insertions were first superadded by the charter of 1820, and have been continued by the act of 1824. But the law is not satisfied by a compliance with that requisite merely. Each requirement of the law must be observed. Here both, namely, 'twelve weeks at least,' and weekly insertions, are essential to the validity of the sale. ”

“ These sales are nowhere regarded with favor, but are everywhere tested by the strictest rules. They are penal, lead to forfeiture of estate, and whatever is prescribed to give them validity must, and ought to be, observed, and has always been required. ”

“ Upon the trial, the plaintiff showed title in herself, and the defendant made title under a tax sale, when the jury, under the instructions of the court, found a verdict for the plaintiff. The following bill of exceptions explains the case.
At the trial of the above cause, after the plaintiff's lessor had shown a legal title in herself, a devisee of D. Homans, who died in August, 1850, to the fifty feet five inches of ground fronting on A street by fifty feet deep, a part of lot 4, in square No. 730, in Washington city, with the houses thereon, being the premises described in the declaration ”

“ The eleventh week ended, either on Friday, the 10th of November, or on Saturday, the 11th, according as the week is made to commence on the day on which the notice first appears, or on the first succeeding Sunday thereafter. ”