Case Name: Jacob MEHLHOFF, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. PIONEER STATE BANK, a corporation, and M. T. Thompson, its President, Defendants and Appellants, and John Geigla, Sheriff of McHenry County, North Dakota, Defendant
Court: North Dakota Supreme Court
Jurisdiction: North Dakota
Decision Date: 1963-10-09
Citations: 124 N.W.2d 401
Docket Number: No. 8062
Parties: Jacob MEHLHOFF, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. PIONEER STATE BANK, a corporation, and M. T. Thompson, its President, Defendants and Appellants, and John Geigla, Sheriff of McHenry County, North Dakota, Defendant.
Judges: STRUTZ, BURKE and ERICKSTAD, JJ., concur.
Reporter: North Western Reporter 2d
Volume: 124
Pages: 401–407

Head Matter:
Jacob MEHLHOFF, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. PIONEER STATE BANK, a corporation, and M. T. Thompson, its President, Defendants and Appellants, and John Geigla, Sheriff of McHenry County, North Dakota, Defendant.
No. 8062.
Supreme Court of North Dakota.
Oct. 9, 1963.
Rehearing Denied Nov. 7, 1963.
Drey & Schwartz, Garrison, for plaintiff and respondent.
Ilvedson, Pringle, Herigstad & Meschke, Minot, attorneys for defendants and appellants.

Opinion:
MORRIS, Chief Justice.
This appeal involves rights of redemption of real estate under the provisions of Chapter 28-24, NDCC. The Pioneer State Bank, a corporation, and M. T. Thompson, its president, appeal from a judgment quieting title in the plaintiff as to any claim of the defendants to certain lands in McHenry County, decreeing cancellation and declaring void a note dated April 5, 1960, given by Roy Lakoduk to Sam Lakoduk, and allowing a reduction in indebtedness of Roy Lakoduk to the appellant Bank.
The controversy grew out of a transaction in November 1951, wherein Ed Lako-duk obtained a loan from the Pioneer State Bank of $25,000, which sum was credited by the Bank to his account.
In order that the loan might be made acceptable to the Bank, Ed Lakoduk prevailed upon his father, Sam Lakoduk, to enter the transaction by augmenting the security for the proposed loan by Sam Lakoduk's note and mortgage on lands owned by the father. Pursuant to the arrangement between Ed Lakoduk, Sam Lakoduk and the Bank, the following mortgages were executed.
On November 7, 1951, Ed Lakoduk gave a mortgage to the Pioneer State Bank for $10,000, on 1,760 acres of land in McHenry County. On the same day his father, Sam Lakoduk, executed a mortgage in favor of the Bank for $10,000, on land that Sam Lakoduk owned in McHenry County. The money from both mortgages was credited to Ed's bank account. Neither was paid when due, and on April 7, 1954, both were renewed by new mortgages. In the case of Ed Lakoduk, the renewal took the form of two mortgages, identified as exhibits A and B. On June 30, 1955, Ed Lakoduk executed another mortgage to the Bank for an additional loan. This instrument is identified as exhibit C. As a part of the renewal transaction, on April 7, 1954, Ed Lakoduk executed a mortgage in favor of Sam Lakoduk for $10,000, covering the same 1,760 acres described in the mortgages of Ed Lakoduk to the Bank. It was recorded in the office of the register of deeds of McHenry County on April 12, 1954, at 10:55 A.M., and is exhibit O. This mortgage was assigned by Sam Lakoduk to the Pioneer State Bank the day after its execution, April 8, 1954, as collateral security for Sam Lakoduk's $10,000 note and mortgage to the Bank.
The mortgages pertinent to the issues given by Ed Lakoduk we tabulate, in the order of their priority, as follows:
Exhibit A, dated April 7, 1954, to Pioneer State Bank, $3,750, recorded April 12, 1954, 10:50 A.M.
Exhibit O, dated April 7, 1954, to Sam Lakoduk, $10,000, recorded April 12, 1954, 10:55 A.M.
Exhibit B, dated April 7, 1954, to Pioneer State Bank, $9,539.71, recorded April 12, 1954, 11 A.M.
Exhibit C, dated June 30, 1955, to Pioneer State Bank, $2,740, recorded July 12, 1955, 9:40 A.M.
The Sam Lakoduk mortgage was foreclosed by the Bank in 1958. The Bank was the purchaser at the foreclosure sale and became the grantee in a sheriff's deed to the Sam Lakoduk land on November 27, 1959.
In 1960, mortgages A, B, and C above listed were foreclosed in one action by the Bank on the 1,760 acres of land of Ed Lakoduk. A separate sale was had under each mortgage. The Bank became the purchaser at the sales. Exhibit O, being the mortgage from Ed Lakoduk to Sam Lako-duk which had been assigned to the Bank, remained unforeclosed and unsatisfied. On April 5, 1960, after the foreclosure sales under mortgages A, B, and C, the Bank released to Sam Lakobuk its assignment of mortgage O, thereby releasing any claim to that mortgage as collateral. The release is Exhibit D, and was recorded April 5, 1960.
On April 5, 1960, Roy Lakoduk, a son of Sam Lakoduk, purchased his father's land from the Pioneer State Bank. Most of the purchase price was obtained through a loan from an insurance company. The balance $2,540.40, still owing to the Bank, was secured by a promissory note dated April 5, 1960, signed by Roy, payable to Sam Lako-duk and endorsed by the payee to the Bank. Sam Lakoduk secured payment of this note by reassigning mortgage exhibit O to the Bank on April 5, 1960. On the same day this assignment was recorded in the office of the register of deeds.
The plaintiff, Jacob Mehlhoff, the as-signee of a judgment that had been entered against Ed Lakoduk on August 8, 1955, redeemed the 1,760 acres of Ed Lakoduk land that had been foreclosed upon in the proceedings involving mortgages A, B, and C. At the time of the redemption the Bank held three certificates of sale issued on the foreclosure of the three mortgages. The certificates show that the sales were held on February 18, 1960. On February 16, 1961, the sheriff of McHenry County issued to Jacob Mehlhoff a certificate of redemption from the sales on the foreclosures of mortgages A, B, and C. Mehlhoff did not tender, as a part of the redemption, payment of the mortgage exhibit O. We note here that at the time of the redemption mortgage O had been reassigned by Sam Lakoduk to the Bank as collateral security for Roy Lakoduk's note of $2,540.40, payable to Sam Lakoduk on demand, and which Sam had endorsed to the Bank.
On March 25, 1961, the Pioneer State Bank, as assignee of mortgage O which had been reassigned to the Bank by the mortgagee Sam Lakoduk on April 5, 1960, made a redemption from the redemption of Jacob Mehlhoff pursuant to which the sheriff of McHenry County issued to the Bank a certificate of redemption dated March 25, 1961. On June 26, 1961, no further redemption having been made, a sheriff's deed was issued to the land described in the mort gage exhibit 0 and in the judgment appealed from, which description is:
E^SWV4, Lots 6 and 7 of Section 6; NE}4, EJ4NWJ4 and- Lots 1 and 2 of Section 7;
SW;4 SEJ4, NW14 and W^NEi^ of Section 32;
Si/⅞ SWi/⅛ of Section 29; NWj4, Lots 1 and 2 of Section 18, All in Township 151 North of Range 78 West;
E14SE14 of Section 1;
NE^NE^ and Si/£SEi4 of Section 12; NE14SE14, SEi^NWK, NEi/jNW^, and NE}4 of Section 13,
All in Township 151 North of Range 79 West;
All of the above land in McHenry County, North Dakota, containing 1,760 acres.
The trial court found that the redemption proceedings instituted by the Bank were void and ordered that the sheriff's deed to the Bank be set aside and that title be quieted in the plaintiff, Mehlhoff.
Section 28-24 — 01, NDCC, sets out who may be entitled to redeem, and provides that "A creditor having a lien by judgment, mortgage, or otherwise on the property sold, or on some share or part thereof, subsequent to that on which the property was sold" may redeem and is termed a redemptioner. In order to be a redemptioner, a person must be a creditor of the mortgagor who has a lien on the property sought to be redeemed subsequent to the lien on which the property was sold. The Bank does not challenge the validity of Mehlhoff's redemption from the foreclosure sales of its mortgages A, B, and C, but insists that it had the right as as-signee of mortgage O to redeem from the plaintiff as redemptioner. Whether it had that right depends on whether it is a creditor having a lien on the property it seeks to redeem subsequent to that on which the property was sold.
There can be no question but that Sam Lakoduk is such a creditor as to the sale under mortgage A. The question then is whether the pledge to the Bank of Ed Lakoduk's note and the assignment of the mortgage securing it constitute the Bank a creditor of Ed Lakoduk. An approved definition of a creditor is "He who has a right to require the fulfillment of an obligation or contract." 1 Bouvier's Law Dictionary, Rawle's Third Revision, page 726; Commerce Trust Co. v. Farmers' Exchange Bank, 332 Mo. 979, 61 S.W.2d 928, 89 A.L.R. 373; Richards-Conover Hardware Co. v. Sharp, 150 Kan. 506, 95 P.2d 360. A similar definition appears in Black's Law Dictionary, Fourth Edition.
When the Bank became the pledgee of Ed Lakoduk's note, it had the right to enforce payment of the note without seeking to enforce its principal obligation against Sam Lakoduk, the pledgor. 72 C.J.S. Pledges § 75; 41 Am.Jur., Pledge and Collateral Security, Section 71; Medler v. Childers, 17 N.M. 530, 131 P. 490.
Not only was Ed Lakoduk's note pledged to the Bank as security for the payment of Sam Lakoduk's note to the Bank, but the mortgage securing the former note was also assigned to the Bank as collateral security. The assignment of the mortgage gave to the Bank a limited ownership in the mortgage commensurate with the assignor's liability to the Bank that was secured by the collateral. 6 C.J.S. Assignments § 93.
"The assignment of a debt ordinarily carries with it all liens and every remedy or security that is incidental to the subject matter of the assignment and that could have been used, or made available, by the assignor as a means of indemnity or payment, even though they are not specifically named in the instrument of assignment, and even though the assignee at the time was ignorant of their existence." 6 Am.Jur. 2d, Assignments, Section 121.
When we take into consideration the rights that passed to the Bank through the pledge of the note and the assignment to it of the mortgage, we reach the conclusion that the Bank is a creditor having a lien on the property sold upon the foreclosure of mortgage A subsequent to that mortgage and therefore is a redemptioner under the provisions of Chapter 28-24, NDCC.
Mortgage O' was a lien superior to mortgages B and C. When Mehlhoff redeemed from the sales held pursuant to the foreclosures of B and C, his rights thus acquired were subject to mortgage 0. When the Bank, by virtue of its assignment of mortgage O, redeemed from Mehlhoff as redemptioner from the foreclosure of mortgage A, the Bank's rights acquired by that redemption were superior to any rights acquired by Mehlhoff, and upon the expiration of 60 days from the Bank's redemption, equitable title passed to the Bank and Mehl-hoff's rights were extinguished. The issuance of a sheriff's deed to the Bank was but a ministerial act of the sheriff which completed the formal transfer of the legal title. Sections 28-24 — 04 and 28-24-13, NDCC. Petters v. Charlson Estate, 69 N.D. 290, 285 N.W. 510; Stevahn v. Meidinger, 79 N.D. 323, 57 N.W.2d 1. The trial court erred in quieting title in Mehlhoff as against the Bank and in setting aside the sheriff's deed of June 26, 1961, conveying the premises to the Pioneer State Bank.
The trial court also decreed the note dated April 26, 1960, for $2,540.40, payable on demand to Sam Lakoduk, and by him pledged and endorsed to the Pioneer State Bank, to be null and void and directed that Roy Lakoduk's indebtedness to the Bank be rer duced by the amount of the note and by an additional $500. Neither Roy Lakoduk nor' Sam Lakoduk was a party to this action. The court not only went beyond the issues in this case, but went beyond its powers in attempting to determine property rights of parties over which it had no jurisdiction.
It is the long established rule that one seeking to quiet title must recover if at all upon the strength of his own title and not upon the weakness of his adversary's title. Among our recent cases supporting this rule are Robertson v. Brown, 75 N.D. 109, 25 N.W.2d 781; Star v. Norsteby, 75 N.D. 563, 30 N.W.2d 718; Shuck v. Shuck, 77 N.D. 628, 44 N.W.2d 767; Sailer v. Mercer County, 77 N.D. 698, 45 N.W.2d 206, 22 A.L.R.2d 988; Hogue v. Bourgois, N.D., 71 N.W.2d 47, 54 A.L.R.2d 633, The plaintiff in this case has wholly failed to establish any title to the property in question.
The judgment appealed from is reversed and the case remanded to the district court for entry of judgment decreeing the sheriff's deed, executed by the sheriff of McHenry County on June 26, 1961, conveying the property therein described to the Pioneer State Bank, to be as against the claims of the plaintiff Mehlhoff a valid conveyance.
STRUTZ, BURKE and ERICKSTAD, JJ., concur.