Page:North Dakota Reports (vol. 2).pdf/43

 75 Va. 239. The only provision in this statute from which it can be inferred that the contracts for the sale or leasing of platted lands were intended to be prohibited, and avoided if made, is that which subjects the vendor or lessor, who has not first complied with the requirements of the law, to a pecuniary penalty. If the purpose of the section was also to prevent such sales and contracts by making them illegal, a purchaser having such knowledge of the facts, as any reasonable prudent purchaser would acquire, violates the law, and is as much in the wrong as the vendor. The fact that no penalty, forfeiture or disability is declared with respect to the purchaser under any circumstances, is worthy of being considered in this connection. The act is wholly consistent with a theory that, as a means of securing the observation of the prescribed requirements of platting and recording, only the specified penalty should be imposed as a consequence of the disregard of the law. It is in the power of the proprietor platting his lands to comply with the requirements of the law. Another person, a purchaser of a portion of the land, cannot do this. A specific penalty is declared for the omission of the former. The statute is silent as to the consequences of the latter." De Mers v. Daniels, 39 Minn. 158, 39 N. W. Rep. 98. The court, in Pangborn v. Westlake, 36 Iowa, 546, holds to the same views, and cites many authorities. See, also opinion of supreme court of the late territory in Territory v. Shearer, 2 Dak. 332; 8 N. W. Rep., bottom page 135. Applying the rules of construction laid down in the cases cited, we find no difficulty in reaching the conclusion, and so hold, that the penal law of this state, which, under certain circumstances, makes it criminal in the mortgagor to sell mortgaged chattels, but does not punish the buyer, was not intended to annul such sales, nor prevent the title from passing to the purchaser when such sales are made. If the title passes to the purchaser, (an l we hold that it doe3,) the purchaser cannot be a wrong-doer in a case where there is no evidence that the purchaser knew that the sale was a crime in the seller. We do not decide what the rule would be in a case where the purchaser consciously and intentionally aided the mortgagor in committing the forbidden act. No such case is before us. The evi-