109 A. 76 | Md. | 1919
This is an appeal from an order overruling a demurrer to an amended petition filed by the appellee to strike out an order of ratification of a tax sale made to the appellants. The Collector of Taxes filed a report of a sale made by him on the 11th day of June, 1917. On the 10th of August, 1918, an order nisi was passed and on October 21, 1918, the sale was finally ratified. The appellee filed a petition in the tax case alleging that on the 24th of July, 1918, he purchased the property from the owner, Simon Rief, who had acquired title to it by a deed dated the 23rd of July, 1907, and held it continuously until the transfer to the petitioner. The petition alleges a number of defects in the proceedings connected with the tax sale, and charges that neither Simon Rief, the former owner of the property, nor petitioner knew of the sale, and that petitioner immediately upon learning of it, took proper steps to make inquiries concerning it, and finding that the sale did unlawfully take place promptly filed the petition. It prays that the order confirming and ratifying the sale be stricken out and vacated forthwith for want of jurisdiction to pass it. The original petition was filed January 28th, 1919, and a demurrer to it was sustained on March 4th, with leave to the petitioner to file an amended petition, which is the one now before us. There is no prayer for process in it, but an order was passed by the Court requiring the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore and the purchasers to show cause why the relief sought should not be granted as prayed. The Mayor and City Council did not appear, but the purchasers filed a demurrer to the amended petition and that being overruled this appeal was taken. *397
The petition was filed in the tax case seeking to have the order of ratification of the sale stricken out by the Court which passed it. It cannot be treated as a bill of review, or a bill in the nature of a bill of review, or such a bill as is often used in cases to set aside tax sales, to also have the cloud on the title removed. It has been held in many cases in this State that the courts act under a special and limited jurisdiction in passing on reports of sales for taxes, and it was not intended by the Legislature that those courts should be called upon to exercise their general equity jurisdiction in such cases. InGuisebert v. Etchison,
After the Court has ratified and confirmed a tax sale under the special authority conferred on it by statute, in the absence of some provision so authorizing, it does not retain control of the case, after the time orders or decrees become enrolled. Until then power may be conceded to vest in such courts, although that is not involved in this case. As we have seen, this sale was made on June 11, 1917, and ratified on the 21st of October, 1918, and the original petition was not filed until the 28th of January, 1919 — over three months after the ratification and over nineteen months after the sale. The only suggestion that we have found in any decision in this State, as to whether there could be an application by *398
petition for a rescission of the order of ratification of a tax sale and a rehearing on the merits was in Meyer v. Steuart,
When that sale again came before this Court, Steuart v.Meyer,
Such a proceeding as that, where a Court of Equity can be called upon for relief, is certainly much more adequate in most cases than a mere petition to strike out the order of ratification, if that was permissible. Generally it is necessary, or at least desirable, to have a deed to the purchaser cancelled and sometimes the purchaser has conveyed the property to another party. The Court, as a Court of Equity having general jurisdiction, can give such relief as is proper. We have taken the pains to look at all of the cases cited in Sections 43 and 48 of the Revised Edition of the Charter of Baltimore and in the notes to the sections in Article 81 applicable to tax sales inBagby's Code, and we have failed to find any in which the petition was filed in the tax case unless it be in Steuart v.Meyer, supra, which was dismissed, *400 but they were either actions of ejectment or bills in equity to have the order of ratification set aside or have the cloud removed, etc., — excepting a few cases where appeals had been taken directly from the orders of ratification, and the fact that there was no right of appeal was apparently overlooked or not pressed.
We are, then, of opinion that the lower Court had no power, sitting in the tax case, to grant relief under the petition filed. We regret that we cannot pass on the question of the validity of the sale, in order to avoid further expense to the parties, but, although there seem from the record to be some errors which would require the sale to be set aside, as invalid, we do not feel at liberty to now definitely determine that question.
Order overruling the demurrer reversed and petition dismissed,the appellee to pay the costs. *401