What is the legal test for an in rem proceeding to obtain possession of property on which taxes have not been paid?

A proceeding by a taxing agency to avail itself of property on which taxes have not been paid is obviously an action in rem and the same general rules should apply as apply to any such action. No in rem proceeding is valid [130 Cal.App.2d 813] where real property directly sought to be reduced to dominion for purposes of sale to satisfy a direct tax lies without the territorial limits of the taxing agency. Hicks v. Corbett, 130 Cal.App.2d 87, 278 P.2d 77. Even though property lies within the territorial limits of a taxing agency, if such agency has no constitutional authority to assess and collect upon it no action in rem will lie to obtain direct dominion over the property for purposes of sale. It certainly cannot be questioned as a matter of simple reason that any purported taxing agency must have sovereign sanction in order to have even de facto power to tax, and any other agency assuming to transgress would be without any legal standing whatever. The existence of a taxing agency duly sanctioned by law is then quite obviously jurisdictional to the exercise of this power, not as the word is applied to procedural questions but as it is applied to the naked power to exercise any such right at all.