Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 2).pdf/415

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NORTHERN PACIFIC RAILROAD CO. v. BARNES.
389

opinion (in which I concurred) as containing anything which sustains the appellant’s contention in this behalf.

Are, then, the averments as to the defects in the tax proceedings such as to warrant the equitable relief sought? We will discuss the question first on the authorities, and then refer to our statute, which had wrought a change in the mode in which the taxpayer is required to do justice. The first irregularity set forth in the complaint is the ommission of the assessor to take and subscribe the statutory oath, and attach the same to the assessment roll. This defect is, however, conceded by the plaintiff and appellant to be insufficient to warrant the maintenance of this action without payment or tender of the tax, or an offer to pay it, set forth in the complaint, in the absence of statutory regulation. No such allegation is made, and therefore, under the authorities, this irregularity must be disregarded in determining whether the plaintiff has any right to be heard in equity, leaving our statute out of consideration for the present. Boeck v. Merriam, 10 Neb. 199, 4 N. W. Rep. 962; Hunt v. Esterday, 10 Neb. 165, 4 N. W. Rep. 952; Wood v. Helmer, 10 Neb. 65, 4 N. W. Rep. 968; Fifield v. Marinet Co., 62 Wis. 532, 22 N. W. Rep. 705; Railroad Co. v. Lincoln Co., 67 Wis. 478, 30 N. W. Rep. 619; Land Co. v. City of Crete, 11 Neb. 344, 7 N. W. Rep. 859; Stell v. Watson (Ark.) 11 S. W. Rep. 822.

The next irregularity pleaded as a ground for equitable relief without payment, tender, or offer to pay is the failure of the county clerk to “make out a tax list containing the description of the lands, * * * with a valuation of each or any of the tracts specified thereon, and the several species of taxes and the total taxes against the said tracts carried out in separate columns opposite each tract, and as nearly as practicable in the form set forth in § 37 and § 39 of chapter 28 of the Political Code of this territory.” There is also an allegation in the same language relating to the duplicate list required by law to be furnished the county treasurer by the county clerk. These two defects will be discussed together. These allegations might be strictly trne, and yet the defect in the list and in the duplicate list might be in some trifling matter of form which could not possibly affect the tax either in law or in equity. The sufficiency