Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 10.djvu/646

6S4 fSDEBAL BEPOBTEB. �MoEA V. NuNEZ and others. {Circuit Court, D. California. February 20, 1882.) �1. VoiD Salb under Judgmbnt for Taxes. �A sale of lands to the highest bidder under an execution issued upon a Per- sonal judgment for taxes, recovered under the statute of California of May 17, 1861, (St. 1861, p. 471,) requiring the sale of the " smallest quantity that any on& will take and pay the judgment," and the tax deed issued upon such sale, are void. �2. Mbxican Ghant Patent. �A patent issued upon the confirmation of a Mexican grant under the act of congress of 1851, to ascertain and aettle land titles in California in an action at law, is conclusive evidence, as against one having no patent, not only of the validity of the grant, but of the correct location of the claim coufirmcd, so as to embrace the lands as described in the patent. �3. Patents— Decheks of Confiiimation— Coxfltct cf. �A claim to certain small tracts of land, church buildings situate thcreon, and appurtenances, was confirmed under the act of 1851; in due form surveyed and located under the act of 1860 ; and patented as so located to Joseph S. Alemany, bishop of Monterey. Another grant, of much larger dimensions, was conllrmed to Eulogio de Celis, the boundaries described in the deoree of confirmation, including the said lands so patented to Bishop Alemany, withput any exception of said lands in said decree. The certifled survey and plat of said grant subse- quently approved by the order or decree of the district court, and the patent issued ihereon, in express tenns reserved and exoepted the lands bcfore pat- ented to Bishop Alemany, thereby excluding them from the operation of the patent issued to De Celis. Rdd, that whether the said survey and patent right- fully or wrongfully excluded said lands, the patent was conclusive as to the title in an action at law, and the patent including the lands must prevail over the patent excluding them, and the decree of confirmation upon whtch it issued. �J. T. Doyle, for plaintiff. �E. J. Pringle and B. S. Brooks, for defendants. �Sawyee, C. j. This is an action to recover the lands known as the Mission Eancho of San Fernando, situate in Los Angeles county. The plaintiff, in his complaint, seeks to recover the entire rancho, containing upwards of 121,000 acres. But the defendant, by sup- plemental answer, alleges that the plaintiff, subsequent to the com- mencement of the action, parfced with his title to a large portion of the rancho, the title to which has beeome vested in the defendant ; and the proofs are admitted to be sufficient to sustain the supple- mental answer as to the lands described in it. The contest is, there- fore, now limited to certain small parcels of land, containing in the aggregate about 76 acres, embraeing the church and appendages and lands claimed to belong thereto, covered by a patent issued to Arch- ��� �