Source: https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/134/316/
Timestamp: 2019-04-25 10:15:38+00:00

Document:
A state may provide by statute that the title to real estate within its limits shall be settled and determined by a suit in which the defendant, being a nonresident, is brought into court by publication.
The well settled rules that an action to quiet title is a suit in equity; that equity acts upon the person, and that the person is not brought into court by service by publication alone do not apply when a state has provided by statute for the adjudication of titles to real estate within its limits as against nonresidents, who are brought into court only by publication.
Hart v. Sansom, 110 U. S. 151, explained.
This was an action to recover possession of land and to quiet title. Judgment for the plaintiff. Defendant sued out this writ of error. The case is stated in the opinion.
"An action may be brought and prosecuted to final decree, judgment, or order by any person or persons, whether, in actual possession or not, claiming title to real estate, against any person or persons who claim an adverse estate or interest therein, for the purpose of determining such estate or interest, and quieting the title to said real estate."
to said real estate, and to decree the title to the same, or any part thereof, to the party entitled thereto, and the court may issue the appropriate order to carry such decree, judgment, or order into effect."
"Service may be made by publication in either of the following cases: . . . Fourth. In actions which relate to, or the subject of which is, real or personal property in this state, where any defendant has or claims a lien or interest, actual or contingent, therein, or the relief demanded consists wholly or partially in excluding him from any interest therein, and such defendant is a nonresident of the state, or a foreign corporation."
"Before service can be made by publication, an affidavit must be filed that service of a summons cannot be made within this state on the defendant or defendants to be served by publication, and that the case is one of those mentioned in the preceding section. When such affidavit is filed, the party may proceed to make service by publication."
"A party against whom a judgment or order has been rendered without other service than by publication in a newspaper may at any time within five years after the date of the judgment or order, have the same opened, and be let in to defend; . . . but the title to any property, the subject of the judgment or order sought to be opened, which by it, or in consequence of it, shall have passed to a purchaser in good faith, shall not be affected by any proceedings under this section, nor shall they affect the title to any property sold before judgment under an attachment."
"When any judgment or decree shall be rendered for a conveyance, release, or acquittance in any court of this state, and the party or parties against whom the judgment or decree shall be rendered do not comply therewith within the time mentioned in said judgment or decree, such judgment or decree shall have the same operation and effect, and be as available, as if the conveyance, release, or acquittance had been executed conformable to such judgment or decree."
another, alleging that he was the owner and in possession of the tracts of land in controversy in this suit; that he held title thereto by virtue of certain tax deeds, which were described; that the defendants claimed to have some title, estate, interest in, or claim upon the lands by patent from the United States, or deed from the patentee, but that whatever title, estate, or claim they had, or pretended to have, was divested by the said tax deeds, and was unjust, inequitable, and a cloud upon plaintiff's title, and that this suit was brought for the purpose of quieting his title. The defendants were brought in by publication, a decree was entered in favor of Flint quieting his title, and it is conceded that all the proceedings were in full conformity with the statutory provisions above quoted.
"The principal question to be determined is whether or not the decree in favor of Gray rendered upon constructive service is valid until set aside. No objection is made to the service, or any proceedings connected with it. The real estate in controversy was within the jurisdiction of the district court, and that court had authority in a proper case to render the decree confirming the title of Gray. In Castrique v. Imrie, L.R. 4 H.L. 414-429, Mr. Justice Blackburn says:"
sovereign authority of that state has conferred on the court jurisdiction to decide as to the disposition of the thing, and the court has acted within its jurisdiction. If these conditions are fulfilled, the adjudication is conclusive against all the world. . . ."
"The court therefore in this case, having authority to render the decree and jurisdiction of the subject matter, its decree is conclusive upon the property until vacated under the statute or set aside."
Section 57, enlarging as it does the class of cases in which relief was formerly afforded by a court of equity in quieting the title to real property, has been sustained by this Court, and held applicable to suits in the federal court. Holland v. Challen, 110 U. S. 15. But it is earnestly contended that no decree in such a case, rendered on service by publication only, is valid or can be recognized in the federal courts, and Hart v. Sansom, 110 U. S. 151, is relied on as authority for this proposition. The propositions are that an action to quiet title is a suit in equity, that equity acts upon the person, and that the person is not brought into court by service by publication alone.
"The power of the state to regulate the tenure of real property within her limits, and the modes of its acquisition and transfer, and the rules of its descent, and the extent to which a testamentary disposition of it may be exercised by its owners, is undoubted. It is an established principle of law everywhere recognized, arising from the necessity of the case, that the disposition of immovable property, whether by deed, descent, or any other mode, is exclusively subject to the government within whose jurisdiction the property is situated."
See also McCormick v. Sullivant, 10 Wheat. 202; Beauregard v. New Orleans, 18 How. 497; Suydam v. Williamson, 24 How. 427; Christian Union v. Yount, 101 U. S. 352; Lathrop v. Bank, 8 Dana 114.
"It is also argued that the decree in the action to quiet title, set forth in the special finding, is in personam, and not in rem, and that the court had no power to render such decree on publication. While it may be true that such decree is not in rem, strictly speaking, yet it must be conceded that it fixed and settled the title to the land then in controversy, and to that extent partakes of the nature of a judgment in rem. But we do not deem it necessary to a decision of this case to determine whether the decree is in personam or in rem. The action was to quiet the title to the land then involved, and to remove therefrom certain apparent liens. Section 318, Rev.Stat. 1881, expressly authorizes the rendition of such a decree on publication."
by the statutes of Kansas. To obtain jurisdiction of anything within the State of Kansas, the statutes of Kansas may make service by publication as good as any other kind of service."
"Jurisdiction is acquired in one of two modes: first, as against the person of the defendant, by the service of process, or second by a procedure against the property of the defendant within the jurisdiction of the court. In the latter case, the defendant is not personally bound by the judgment beyond the property in question. And it is immaterial whether the proceeding against the property be by an attachment or bill in chancery. It must be substantially a proceeding in rem. A bill for the specific execution of a contract to convey real estate is not strictly a proceeding in rem in ordinary cases, but where such a procedure is authorized by statute on publication without personal service or process, it is substantially of that character."
institute proceedings by a public notice in some newspaper, describing the land, stating the authority under which it was sold, and"
"calling on all persons who can set up any right to the lands so purchased, in consequence of any informality or any irregularity or illegality connected with the sale, to show cause why the sale so made should not be confirmed."
"In case no one appears to contest the regularity of the sale, the court is required to confirm it on finding certain facts to exist. But if opposition be made, and it should appear that the sale was made 'contrary to law,' it became the duty of the court to annul it. The judgment or decree in favor of the grantee in the deed operates 'as a complete bar against any and all persons who may thereafter claim such land in consequence of any informality or illegality in the proceedings.' It is a very great evil in any community to have titles to land insecure and uncertain, and especially in new states, where its result is to retard the settlement and improvement of their vacant lands. Where such lands have been sold for taxes, there is a cloud on the title of both claimants which deters the settler from purchasing from either. A prudent man will not purchase a lawsuit or risk the loss of his money and labor upon a litigious title. The act now under consideration was intended to remedy this evil. It is in substance a bill of peace. The jurisdiction of the court over the controversy is founded on the presence of the property, and, like a proceeding in rem, it becomes conclusive against the absent claimant, as well as the present contestant. As was said by the court in Clark v. Smith, 13 Pet. 203, with regard to a similar law of Kentucky:"
of proceeding on the chancery side of the federal courts, no reason exists why it should not be pursued in the same form as in the state court."
"In the case before us, the proceeding, though special in its form, is in its nature but the application of a well known chancery remedy. It acts upon the land, and may be conclusive as to the title of a citizen of another state."
"Such service may also be sufficient in cases where the object of the action is to reach and dispose of property in the state, or of some interest therein, by enforcing a contract or lien respecting the same, or to partition it among different owners, or, when the public is a party, to condemn and appropriate it for a public purpose. In other words, such service may answer in all actions which are substantially proceedings in rem. . . . It is true that, in a strict sense, a proceeding in rem is one taken directly against property, and has for its object the disposition of the property, without reference to the title of individual claimants; but in a larger and more general sense, the terms are applied to actions between parties, where the direct object is to reach and dispose of property owned by them, or of some interest therein. Such are cases commenced by attachment against the property of debtors, or instituted to partition real estate, foreclose a mortgage, or enforce a lien. So far as they affect property in the state, they are substantially proceedings in rem, in the broader sense which we have mentioned."
These cases were all before the decision of Hart v. Sansom.
to meet the eyes of everybody, is to stand for such notice. The publication itself is sufficient if it had been in the form of a personal service upon the party himself within the county. Nor have we any doubt that this form of warning owners of property to appear and defend their interests, where it is subject to demands for public use when authorized by statute, is sufficient to subject the property to the action of the tribunals appointed by proper authority to determine those matters. The owner of real estate who is a nonresident of the state within which the property lies cannot evade the duties and obligations which the law imposes upon him in regard to such property by his absence from the state. Because he cannot be reached by some process of the courts of the state, which, of course, have no efficacy beyond their own borders, he cannot therefore hold his property exempt from the liabilities, duties, and obligations which the state has a right to impose upon such property, and, in such cases, some substituted form of notice has always been held to be a sufficient warning to the owner of the proceedings which are being taken under the authority of the state to subject his property to those demands and obligations; otherwise the burdens of taxation, and the liability of such property to be taken under the power of eminent domain, would be useless in regard to a very large amount of property in every State of the union."
In this connection, it is well to bear in mind that by the statutes of the United States, in proceedings to enforce any legal or equitable lien or to remove a cloud upon the title of real estate, nonresident holders of real estate may be brought in by publication, 18 Stat. 472, and the validity of this statute, and the jurisdiction conferred by publication, have been sustained by this Court. Mellen v. Moline Iron Works, 131 U. S. 352.
These various decisions of this Court establish that in its judgment, a state has power by statute to provide for the adjudication of titles to real estate within its limits as against nonresidents who are brought into court only by publication, and that is all that is necessary to sustain the validity of the decree in question in this case.
"that the several deeds in plaintiffs' petition mentioned be, and the same are hereby, annulled and cancelled and for naught held, and that the cloud be thereby removed,"
"It is difficult to see how any part of that judgment (except for costs) is applicable to Hart, for that part which is for recovery of possession certainly cannot apply to Hart, who was not in possession, and that part which removes the cloud upon the plaintiffs' title appears to be limited to the cloud created by the deeds mentioned in the petition, and the petition does not allege, and the verdict negatives, that Hart held any deed. "
"It would doubtless be within the power of the state in which the land lies to provide by statute that if the defendant is not found within the jurisdiction, or refuses to make or to cancel a deed, this should be done in his behalf by a trustee appointed by the court for that purpose."
And of course it follows that if a state has power to bring in a nonresident by publication for the purpose of appointing a trustee, it can in like manner bring him in and subject him to a direct decree. There was presented no statute of the State of Texas providing directly for quieting the title of lands within the state as against nonresidents brought in only by service by publication, such as we have in the case at bar, and the only statute cited by counsel or referred to in the opinion was a mere general provision for bringing in nonresident defendants in any case by publication, and it was not the intention of the court to overthrow that series of earlier authorities, heretofore referred to, which affirm the power of the state, by suitable statutory proceedings, to determine the titles to real estate within its limits as against a nonresident defendant, notified only by publication.
It follows from these considerations that the first question presented in the certificate of division -- the one heretofore stated, and which is decisive of this case -- must be answered in the affirmative.
The judgment of the circuit court is reversed, and the case remanded for further proceedings in accordance with the views herein expressed.

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