Whitney v. Hay

181 U.S. 77 (1901)

WHITNEY
v.
HAY.

No. 112.

Supreme Court of United States.

Argued November 15, 16, 1900. Decided April 8, 1901. APPEAL FROM THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.

Mr. A.S. Worthington for appellant. Mr. B.F. Leighton was on his brief.

Mr. Jeremiah M. Wilson and Mr. A.A. Hoehling, Jr., for appellee. Mr. E.B. Hay was on their brief.

MR. JUSTICE HARLAN, after stating the facts as above reported, delivered the opinion of the court.

It appears from this statement that Doctor and Mrs. Piper, each somewhat advanced in years, were without children and had no kin to whom the husband desired to bequeath his estate. They longed for the comforts and happiness of a home in which they would have the sympathy, attention and care of younger people upon whom they could look as their children.

The bill alleged that the property in question was purchased by Doctor Piper in execution of an agreement in parol between him and Hay, whereby Piper and his wife were to become members of Hay's household in Washington and to be supported, maintained and cared for by Hay during their respective lives, in consideration of which Piper was to convey by will or otherwise to Hay all of his property of every kind and wherever situated; that in part execution of that agreement Piper purchased the lots in question and built a house thereon; that in further execution of it Piper put Hay in possession of the lot and house to be occupied as a home by the latter and his family in connection with Piper and his wife; and that while the plaintiff was in actual occupancy of the premises as his home — and he was still in such occupancy when this suit was brought — Piper, in violation of his agreement and for the purpose solely of defrauding the plaintiff, put the title to the property in his niece, the defendant Whitney.

Was there any such agreement between Piper and Hay? If so, was there such part performance of it as entitled the plaintiff to a conveyance from Piper, had he lived until the decree was passed? These are the questions for determination in this case.

In the allegations of his bill and in every essential fact Hay is so thoroughly sustained by witnesses that we do not hesitate to declare that the agreement with Piper is proved to have been just as stated by him. There can be no reasonable doubt as to its subject-matter, or its terms. There was no element of fraud or misrepresentation on the part of Hay. The terms of the agreement between him and Piper were clear and definite; its provisions fair, just and reasonable; the consideration mutual and entirely adequate. What Hay asked was not in any sense inequitable. That which he undertook to do in execution of the agreement was done by him promptly and in such way as to give no cause for complaint or objection by Piper. And all that he did had reference to and was consistent with the agreement, and can be referred to nothing else. His plans of life were materially altered in order that he might take care of Piper and wife during their respective lives. Piper put Hay in actual possession of the premises in question in execution of his agreement with Hay. But he failed to do that which was vital to Hay, namely, to put the absolute title to the property in him. Under all the circumstances, the failure of Piper to invest Hay with the legal title was such a wrong to the latter as entitled him, under the established principles of equity, to the protection which would be given by a decree specifically declaring that the defendant holds the title in trust for him. We are of opinion that such relief is consistent with the objects intended to be subserved by the Statute of Frauds; for the decree in favor of Hay does not charge Piper upon his parol contract with him, but rests upon the equities arising out of the acts and conduct of the parties subsequent to the making of the original agreement.

Referring to the Statute of Frauds and to the mischiefs intended to be reached by it, Mr. Justice Story says: "It is obvious that courts of equity are bound, as much as courts of law, by the provisions of this statute; and therefore they are not at liberty to disregard them. That they do, however, interfere in some cases within the reach of the statute is equally certain. But they do so, not upon any notion of any right to dispense with it, but for the purpose of administering equities subservient to its true objects, or collateral to it, and independent of it." A case of such interference is when a court of equity enforces the specific performance "of a contract within the statute, where the parol agreement has been partly carried into execution. The distinct ground upon which courts of equity interfere in cases of this sort is, that otherwise one party would be enabled to practice a fraud upon the other; and it could never be the intention of the statute to enable any party to commit such a fraud with impunity. Indeed, fraud in all cases constitutes an answer to the most solemn acts and conveyances, and the objects of the statute are promoted, instead of being obstructed, by such a jurisdiction for discovery and relief. And where one party has executed his part of the agreement, in the confidence that the other party would do the same, it is obvious, if the latter should refuse, it would be a fraud upon the former to suffer this refusal to work to his prejudice." 1 Story's Eq. Juris. §§ 754, 759.

This rule finds illustration in cases in this court; in Neale v. Neales, 9 Wall. 1, 9, where it was said that "the statute of frauds requires a contract concerning real estate to be in writing, but courts of equity, whether wisely or not it is too late now to inquire, have stepped in and relaxed the rigidity of this rule, and hold that a part performance removes the bar of the statute, on the ground that it is a fraud for the vendor to insist on the absence of a written instrument, when he had permitted the contract to be partly executed;" in Brown v. Sutton, 129 U.S. 238-9, which was a suit to enforce the specific performance of an oral engagement to convey certain real estate to the promisee, in consideration of her taking care of the promisor during the remainder of his life, as she had done in the past, the court holding that there had been such "part performance in its execution" as to bring the case within the exception made by that doctrine in the requirement of the Statute of Frauds that the sale of the lands must be in writing; and in Townsend v. Vanderwerker, 160 U.S. 171, 184, where it was said that "the general principle to be extracted from the authorities is that if the plaintiff, with the knowledge and consent of the promisor, does acts pursuant to and in obvious reliance upon a verbal agreement, which so changed the relations of the parties as to render a restoration of their former condition impracticable, it is a virtual fraud upon the part of the promisor to set up the statute in defence, and thus to receive to himself the benefit of the acts done by the plaintiff, while the latter is left to the chance of a suit at law for the reimbursement of his outlays, or to an action upon a quantum meruit for the value of his services." "Courts of equity," said Lord Cottenham, "exercise their jurisdiction in decreeing specific performance of verbal agreements, where there has been part performance, for the purpose of preventing the great injustice which would arise from permitting a party to escape from the engagements he has entered into, upon the ground of the Statute of Frauds, after the other party to the contract has, upon the faith of such engagement, expended his money or otherwise acted in execution of the agreement. Under such circumstances, the court will struggle to prevent such injustice from being effected; and, with that object, it has, at the hearing, when the plaintiff has failed to establish the precise terms of the agreement, endeavored to collect, if it can, what the terms of it really were. It is not necessary, in this case, to adopt any such course of proceeding; for I think an agreement for a lease sufficiently proved, and that acts of part performance are proved, so as to take the case out of the Statute of Frauds; and I think the defences set up have wholly failed." Mundy v. Jolliffe, 5 My. & Cr. 167, 177.

To the like effect are numerous other American and English cases which are familiar to the profession and need not be cited. They all proceed upon the ground that, although in a suit to enforce the specific performance of a parol agreement in reference to land the defendant cannot be directly charged upon the alleged contract itself, he may be held — the evidence clearly showing part performance, in substantial particulars, of such agreement — to do what justice requires to be done under the equities arising from acts done after the making of the agreement and in execution of its provisions. To refuse under some circumstances to compel the full execution of an agreement of that kind which has been partly performed would make the statute an instrument of fraud, and that a court of equity will not permit. "It is not arbitrary or unreasonable," said the Lord Chancellor in Maddison v. Alderson, L.R. 8 App. Cas. 467, 476, "to hold that when the statute says that no action is to be brought to charge any person upon a contract concerning land, it has in view the simple case in which he is charged upon the contract only, and not that in which there are equities resulting from res gestae subsequent to and arising out of the contract."

The alleged agreement being one which a court of equity would specifically enforce if it had been in writing, and it having been partly performed by Hay in reliance upon performance by Piper, and Hay being ready and willing to do what, under the agreement, remained to be done by him during the lives of Doctor and Mrs. Piper, he was entitled to the decree rendered in his favor; and it is

Affirmed.