Paschall v. Christie-Stewart, Inc.

414 U.S. 100, 94 S. Ct. 313, 38 L. Ed. 2d 298, 1973 U.S. LEXIS 176

Opinions

Per Curiam.

In this case we noted probable jurisdiction, 411 U. S. 915 (1973), in order to consider whether the published notice provisions of the then-applicable Oklahoma tax-sale statutes, Okla. Stat., Tit. 68, §§ 382 and 432b (1951), comported with due process of law guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.¹ See Mullane v. Central Han over Bank & Trust Co., 339 U. S. 306 (1950). This was the only issue addressed by the appellate courts of Oklahoma ² and by the parties in the Jurisdictional Statement and the papers responsive thereto filed with this Court.

After oral argument and upon our review of the record, it now appears that there might have been an independent and, possibly, an unchallenged ground for the judgment of the state trial court, viz., the running of the Oklahoma period of limitation for adverse claims.³ If that should prove to be the case, any decision by this Court would be advisory and beyond our jurisdiction. Murdock v. City of Memphis, 20 Wall. 590, 636 (1875).

The judgment of the Supreme Court of Oklahoma is therefore vacated and the case is remanded to that court to consider whether the appellants preserved the right to challenge the 'trial court’s determination that the State’s statute of limitations is a bar to their mineral rights claim, and, if so, whether, under state law, the statute of limitations independently bars appellants’ claim, irrespective of the constitutional adequacy of the tax-sale notice provisions of §§ 382 and 432b.⁴ Cf. Walker v. Hoffman, 405 P. 2d 57 (Okla. 1965).

It is so ordered.

Footnotes

1

The ad valorem taxes in question were for the year 1952. The original tax sale took place in November 1953 and the resale in May 1956. Okla. Stat., Tit. 68, §§ 383 and 432 (1951). The statutes cited (§§ 382, 383, 432, and 432b) were repealed by Okla. Sess. Laws 1965, c. 501, § 3, and replaced by corresponding provisions of the State’s present Ad Valorem Tax Code, namely, Okla. Stat. Ann., Tit. 68, §§24312, 24313, 24329, and 24331 (1966).

2

See 502 P. 2d 1265 (1972). The earlier opinion of the Oklahoma Court of Appeals, Division 2, is not reported; it is reproduced in the Jurisdictional Statement, App. A, p. vii.

3

The trial court’s judgment read in part as follows:

“ (2) The Court Further Finds, Orders, Adjudges and Decrees that from the date of the recording of said resale tax deed, on June 6, 1956 ... said Grantees therein, the Cross-Petitioners, R. W. Garrett and R. H. Vaughn, have been in the open, continuous, visible, notorious, exclusive and hostile possession of said lands and premises, receiving all of the rents, profits and income therefrom, and that said contesting substituted party defendants, are further forever barred and precluded by the statute of limitations, from seeking to assert the invalidity of said resale tax deed, as provided by 12 O. S. 1961, Sec. 93 (3) and (6).” Jurisdictional Statement, App. B, p. xvii.

Okla. Stat. Ann., Tit. 12, §93 (Supp. 1973-1974), reads:

§ 93. Limitation of real actions. — “Actions for the recovery of real property, or for the determination of any adverse right or interest therein, can only be brought within the periods hereinafter prescribed, after the cause of action shall have accrued, and at no other time thereafter:

“(3) An action for the recovery of real property sold for taxes, within five (5) years after the date of the recording of the tax deed . . . provided, nothing herein shall be construed as reviving any cause of action for recovery of real property heretofore barred nor as divesting any interest acquired by adverse possession prior to the effective date hereof.

“(6) Numbered paragraphs 1, 2, and 3 shall be fully operative regardless of whether the deed or judgment or the precedent -action or proceeding upon which such deed or judgment is based is void or voidable in whole or in part, for any reason, jurisdictional or otherwise; provided that this paragraph shall not be applied so as to bar causes of action which have heretofore accrued, until the expiration of one (1) year from and after its effective date.”

4

Whether the alleged lack of constitutionally valid notice would preclude the running of the statute of limitations for an adverse land claim is a question that has not been presented to this Court or to the Oklahoma courts below. Cf. Shroeder v. City of New York, 371 U. S. 208, 213-214 (1962). We intimate no view on this issue.