Case ID: mass_123/html/0288-01.html
Source: Caselaw Access Project
Author: {"author": "Gray, C. J.", "license": "Public Domain", "url": "https://static.case.law/"}
Date Created: 2024-08-24T03:29:51.129683

Israel Harmon & another vs. Terrence Flanagan & another.
    Hampden.
    Sept. 26.
    Oct. 2, 1877.
    Endicott & Lord, JJ., absent Soule, J., did not sit.
    Where the owner of land leases it to A., subject to a lease of part of the same to B., for a shorter term, A. “ to collect rent from B. for so much of the term as has not elapsed,” A. is entitled to the rent subsequently accruing under B.’s lease, and may sue for it in his own name.
    Contract, by Israel Harmon and Henry Cooley, against Terrence Flanagan and F. W. Helen, to recover the rent of certain rooms in a block on Main Street in Springfield. Writ dated May 6, 1876.
    At the trial in the Superior Court, before Brigham, C. J., the plaintiffs introduced in evidence a lease from one Townsley to the defendants, dated May 1, 1871, of the northerly half of the second and third stories of the above block “for the term of five years from the first day of May, A. D. 1871, yielding and paying therefor the rent of one thousand dollars per annum,” and also a lease from Townsley to the plaintiffs, dated February 10, 1873, of the northerly half of the same block, containing the following clause: The premises are leased subject to the lease of Helen and Flanagan, now on the upper part thereof, and the said Harmon and Cooley are entitled to collect rent from them for so much of the term as has not elapsed at March 1st next. This lease is to continue for the term, of ten years, said term and the rent to commence on the first day of March, 1873, and to terminate on the first day of March, 1883.”
    The defendants asked the judge to rule that, by the terms of the instrument from Townsley to the plaintiffs, no assignment, of the original lease to the defendants, was made; and that the plaintiffs were not thereby made capable of maintaining this action in their own names. The judge declined so to rule, but instructed the jury that, it being conceded that the defendants executed the lease, they were liable to pay the rent to the end of the term, and that the assignment and conveyance by Townsley to the plaintiffs would enable them to maintain the action ; and directed the jury to return a verdict for the plaintiffs. The defendants alleged exceptions.
    
      
      H. B. Stevens, for the defendants.
    
      M. JP. Knowlton, for the plaintiffs.
   Gray, C. J.

The lease for ten years from the owner of the fee to the plaintiffs expressly conveyed to them an estate in the premises extending beyond the term of the prior lease for five years to the defendants, and the rent subsequently accruing under that lease, and entitled them to sue for such rent in their own names. Burden v. Thayer, 3 Met. 76. Kendall v. Carland, 5 Cush. 74. Hunt v. Thompson, 2 Allen, 341.

Exceptions overruled.