Doremus v. Cameron. deed were, in express terms, only of the interest of Cameron-in other words, that they were of the premises subject to the mortgage he should have filed a replication and taken proofs. As the case is presented, I must assume that all rights in the premises which the receiver could sell and convey were intended to be sold, and that the deed of the receiver of taxes purports to convey all that such officer could convey. This reference to the form in which the case is presented is induced by the evident misapprehension of the complainant's counsel as to the effect which is to be given to the allegations of the bill in this hearing. The complainant's main reliance is upon the following insist ments: First. That the taxes assessed in 1874 were not a lien upon the premises paramount to his mortgage. Second. That, if they were a paramount lien, such lien continued for two years only, and expired before the proceedings for sale, and sale itself, were had, and that therefore no title to the premises passed in virtue of the receiver's sale. Under the first of these insistments it was argued (a) that when the complainant's mortgage was made, in 1868, taxes were not, by law, made a lien upon lands in Paterson, paramount to other encumbrances thereon; and (b) that a subsequent law making taxes a lien, superior to a mortgage that then existed, would be unconstitutional, in that it would impair the obligation of a contract theretofore made. The city of Paterson was incorporated in 1851. P. L. of 1851 p. 444. In 1861 (P. L. of 1861 p. 320) its charter was revised. In that revision it was provided that assessments for taxes should be and remain a lien upon the lands assessed, for five years; that the land should be sold for non-payment of the tax; that "the owner, mortgagee, occupant or any person having a legal or equitable interest" in the lands might, within one year, redeem the lands, and that thereupon "the said owner, mortgagee or occupant might re-enter and repossess the lands as if the sale had not been made." Doremus t. Cameron. The law stood in this way when the complainant's mortgage was made. In 1869 (P. L. of 1869 p. 706) the charter was again revised, retaining the provisions of the act of 1861, above referred to. In 1871 (P. L. of 1871 p. 808) it was further revised, when it was enacted that assessments for taxes should be and remain a lien upon all property, on account of which the assessment should be made, with interest, costs and penalties, " from the time when the taxes were payable." There was no specification of a length of time for which the lien should continue. This revision also provided for a sale for the non-payment of taxes, for the issuance of a certificate of sale, and that at any time within twelve months after the issue of such certificate, "the owner, mortgagee, tenant or any person having a legal or equitable interest" in the property sold, might redeem it from the sale. This revision was in full force when the property in question was assessed for the taxes of 1874. It is perceived that each of the statutes referred to provided that the assessment for taxes should be a lien, and that a mortgagee of the property, after it should be sold for non-payment of such assessment, might redeem within a specified time. In the City of Paterson v. O'Neill, 5 Stew. Eq. 386, the question whether the assessment for taxes, under the revised charter of 1871 for Paterson, was made a lien, paramount to an existing. mortgage upon the property assessed, was determined by the decision of the court of errors and appeals, which held that, although such paramount lien was not expressly declared, it was given by implication from the provisions that the estate of the mortgagee should be exempted from assessment; that the assessment, to the full value of the property, should be made against the owner; that it should be valid, notwithstanding any error or omission in naming the owner; and that the mortgagee, tenant or any person having a legal or equitable interest in the premises. might redeem the same when sold. The greatest importance was attached to the last of these provisions. As to it Judge Dodd, who wrote the opinion of the court, said: "I cannot doubt that the intention is evinced to Doremus v. Cameron. make the lien of the tax paramount to that of the mortgage. Unless this be so, no good or satisfactory reason is perceived why this provision on behalf of the mortgagee was enacted. If his estate were intended to be left unaffected by and paramount to the tax, why should he need to redeem? Why redeem or buy back what had not been sold away?" The charter of 1861, which was in force, as has been said, when the mortgage here in question was made, provided that all property should be assessed at its full value against the owner thereof; that it should be valid notwithstanding any error or omission in naming the owner, and that the owner, mortgagee, occupant or any person having a legal or equitable interest in the premises might redeem the same when sold. It is noted that it contained all the factors that influenced the decision of the court of errors and appeals in its construction of the charter of 1871, save that in the last-mentioned charter mortgages were exempted from taxation. I fail to perceive that that provision, although it was stated in the opinion of Judge Dodd, had potent significance in the decision. It is impossible to escape the conviction that the legislature's intention to make the taxes paramount to the lien of a mortgage is as plainly apparent in the charter of 1861 as it was in the charter construed by the court of errors and appeals. Indeed, if anything, it is more plainly evinced, for in the charter of 1861 there is no provision that the purchaser shall give notice before he shall receive a deed. Such a provision in the charter of 1871, which requires a notice to the owner alone and not to the mortgagee, indicated to the mind of the chancellor, in his decision of Paterson v. O'Neill, that the legislative intent was that the tax was not to be paramount to a mortgage. Construing the charter of 1861 as indicated, it is perceived that there has been no change in the legal relation of the tax and mortgage liens since the complainant's mortgage was made, and consequently the question does not arise, whether, after a mortgage has been made, a tax can, by law, be given precedence in lien upon the mortgaged land, and thus, to its extent, supersede and impair the obligation of the mortgage. Doremus v. Cameron. But had such question arisen, it must have been determined against the complainant, for it is well settled that, in the exercise of its sovereign power of taxation, the state may displace prior encumbrances, although the displacement may be prejudicial to individual right. Hopper v. Malleson, 1 C. E. Gr. 386; Campbell v. Howland, 5 C. E. Gr. 186; Morrow v. Dows, 1 Stew. Eq. 459; Trustees &c. v. Trenton, 3 Stew. Eq. 679; Howell v. The Essex Road Board, 5 Stew. Eq. 672; Lydecker v. Palisade Land Co., 6 Stew. Eq. 415; Hand v. Startup, 11 Stew. Eq. 115. The only inquiry would have been whether the legislative intent was clearly manifested, and, as has been seen, that inquiry has been authoritatively answered by the court of errors and appeals in Paterson v. O'Neill. This brings me to the consideration of the second insistment of the complainant, that the lien for the taxes of 1874 had expired before the sale was had on the 9th of April, 1878. If the complainant be correct in this contention, the sale was ultra vires and void. Johnson v. Van Horn, 16 Vr. 136; Field v. West Orange, 10 Stew. Eq. 434, 12 Stew. Eq 60; Kirkpatrick v. New Brunswick, 13 Stew. Eq. 56. By the sixtieth section of the charter of 1861 assessments for taxes thereafter to be made on account of any lands were made a lien upon such lands for five years from the time when the taxes were payable. The eighty-fifth section of the revision of the charter in 1869 contained the same provision, and that revision reserved from repeal any act or part of act theretofore existing. The charter of 1871 omitted the provision that the lien should continue for five years, but instead thereof provided that the taxes should be and remain a lien indefinitely from the time when they were payable. By the one hundred and seventyfifth section of this act of 1871, after the express repeal of several statutes and general repeal of inconsistent legislation, it is provided, as in the act of 1869, that nothing in its repealing clauses should destroy, impair or take away any right or remedy acquired or given by any act or part of act thereby repealed, except where in the act it was expressly so provided. Doremus v. Cameron. Thus the law stood at the time of the sale of the land here involved. Now, as has been seen, previous to the act of 1871, the right of the city of Paterson to a lien for unpaid taxes for five years, was secured by law. There was no express repeal of the provisions of law which invested it with that right. The language of the act of 1871, as to duration of the lien, is of indefinite import. It means either that the lien shall be unlimited in point of time, or, in failing to fix time for the continuance of the lien, to leave the provisions of the law, upon that point, undisturbed. In either event a lien for five years is assured, and, when the sale was had in 1878, the lien had not expired. It was also urged for the complainant that the fifty-second section of the charter of 1871 requires that the goods and chattels of a delinquent taxpayer shall be exhausted by distress and sale before his land shall be resorted to, and that, as such exhaustion is not averred in the answer, a title in the defendants paramount to the mortgage does not appear. It is shown that that section provides that on and after the 15th of January in each year (changed by subsequent legislation to the third Monday in October) it shall be the duty of the receiver of taxes to levy and make any unpaid tax assessed on real or personal property, by distress and sale of the goods and chattels of delinquent taxpayers, the proceeds of the sale to be applied first to the satisfaction of the tax on the personal estate, and next to the satisfaction of the tax upon the real estate, and that the next succeeding section provides that on or before the third Monday in May of each year the receiver shall present to the board of aldermen a full return and statement of the taxes remaining unpaid, "in whole or in part," on the first of that month, and that the board of aldermen shall thereupon order the sale of real estate, and it is urged that it was obviously the intention of the lawmakers that personalty should be exhausted in the satisfaction of taxes before the realty should be resorted to for that purpose, and that this intention is so strongly indicated, not only by the prescribed order of procedure, but also by the language of the fifty-third section, which contem |