Cordano

Plaintiffs brought the action to quiet their title to a certain lot situated in the city of Oakland, claimed by defendants through their purchase of the property at tax sale for the nonpayment of taxes assessed for the fiscal year 1904-5. Plaintiffs had judgment in their favor from which defendants appealed.

The judgment was reversed for the reasons given in our opinion written by Mr. Justice Hart, reported in 19 Cal. App. Dec., p. 823 (No. 988). At the trial it was stipulated that plaintiffs were the owners in fee of the property, “excepting in so far as their title, or the title of either of them, is affected by a certain deed from the tax-collector, James B. Barber, to the defendants in this action, made on the twenty-eighth day of March, 1911, and by the proceedings leading up to the same” and that, excepting for the year 1904, plaintiffs had paid all taxes assessed against said property. The controversy hinged, therefore, upon the validity or invalidity of defendants’ title acquired through said tax-collector’s deed. The trial court found that the sale of the property to the state and also the sale by the state through the tax-collector’s deed were invalid because of certain…