People ex rel. Wernsing v. Winter

Citations

• 116 Ill. 211

Syllabus

<p>1. Taxation—remedies for collection—by personal action, and in rem— whether concurrent—rights of holder of certificate of sale under personal judgment—subrogation. In 1879 a personal judgment in favor of the People ■was recovered against a party for taxes due on his land for the years 1870 to 1878, inclusive, and a transcript thereof filed in the office of the circuit clerk, and execution sued out and levied on the defendant’s homestead, which was stricken off to the county upon a bid for the full amount of the judgment. The county sold the certificate of purchase, whereby all the taxes were received and paid over. The purchaser of the certificate took out a sheriff’s deed, and finding the sale was invalid, as being of a homestead, filed a bill and lyid the sale and satisaction of the judgment set aside, and was by the decree subrogated to the rights of the county. After this personal judgment these taxes were dropped from the collector’s books from 1879 to 1884, when they were again entered on the tax books, and in May, 1885, the collector applied for judgment against the same land for these taxes, but on objections interposed, the county court refused judgment: Held, that the judgment was proper, there being no taxes due on the land for those years, and that application for judgment could not be had for the use of the purchaser of the certificate of purchase and equitable owner of the personal judgment.</p> <p>2. A purchaser of land under execution issued upon a personal judgment in favor of the State for taxes, failing to acquire any title, and who is by the decree subrogated to the rights of the State to collect the judgment for his use, will not have the right to proceed in rem in the name of the State to enforce collection of the judgment. The right to proceed in personam against a person for taxes due on his land, and in rem against his land, belongs exclusively to the State, and can not be exercised by private persons.</p>