Assuming, without deciding, that the error in the description in the published notice constituted a jurisdictional defect and rendered the tax foreclosure proceeding void as to Williams, plaintiffs are barred from recovery for the reasons stated in Hood River County v. Dabney, 84 Or Adv Sh 179, 246 Or. 14, 423 P.2d 954 (1967). See also Deardorff v. Hood River County, 84 Or Adv Sh 175, 246 Or. 7, 423 P.2d 952 (1967); Evergreen Timber v. Hood River Co., 84 Or Adv Sh 205, 246 Or. 11, 423 P.2d 963 (1967); Johnson v. State of Oregon, 245 Or. 618, 621, 423 P.2d 964 (1967). The decree of the trial court is affirmed.
Plaintiffs also rely on ORS 203.010 and ORS 105.605. Analogous arguments based on those statutes were rejected, expressly or implicitly, in Kern Land Co. et al v. Lake County, supra, 232 Or at 408, 409 n 4. Plaintiffs suggest that the Supreme Court's cases do not make absolute the principle that counties are immune from quiet title actions. They rely, inter alia, on City of North Bend v. County of Coos, 259 Or. 147, 485 P.2d 1226 (1971), and Evergreen Tim. Co. v. Clackamas Co., 235 Or. 552, 385 P.2d 1009 (1963), overruled on unrelated grounds, Johnson v. State, 245 Or. 618, 626, 418 P.2d 509, 423 P.2d 964 (1967). In those cases, however, the court explained that, over and above the quiet title allegations, there were additional factors that made the claims actionable under applicable statutes — an action on a contract under ORS 30.320 in City of North Bend and a foreclosure-related remedy under ORS 312.230 in Evergreen Tim. Co. No such additional factors are claimed to be present here.
After Hood River County, it is unlikely that the Supreme Court would decide Hughes the same way if it were again confronted with the case, and no doubt the language in Hughes on which respondent relies no longer represents the Supreme Court's thinking on the legislature's power to bar challenges to void judgments or decrees. In Hood River County, 246 Or at 30-31, the Supreme Court expressly overruled its decision in Evergreen Tim. Co. v. Clackamas Co., 235 Or. 552, 385 P.2d 1009 (1963), in which it had relied partially upon Hughes for the proposition that the legislature cannot, by a Statute of Limitations, bar a taxpayer's challenge to a tax foreclosure decree if that decree is void. Furthermore, in Johnson v. State, 245 Or. 618, 625-26, 418 P.2d 509, 423 P.2d 964 (1967), the court followed Hood River County and overruled Elliott v. Clement, 175 Or. 44, 149 P.2d 985, 151 P.2d 739 (1944), the only Oregon case relied on in Hughes for the proposition that a Statute of Limitation does not apply to a judgment void on its face. Hood River County, of course, was not an adoption case, but the general issue there was the same as the issue here, the legislature's power to bar challenges to judgments and decrees void for want of jurisdiction. If the legislature can do so with respect to tax foreclosure decrees, we perceive no reason why it cannot do so with respect to adoption decrees.
Id. The State contends, however, that adverse possession may be acquired by the State engaging in "typical land management", citing the case of Johnson v. State, 245 Or. 618, 418 P.2d 509, 423 P.2d 964 (1966). However, the stipulated facts in this matter do not reveal what "typical land management" the State engaged in so as to bring this case into play.