Court Opinion

ID: 9620552
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 05:43:45.741576+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:04:51.639178
License: Public Domain

COOPER, Concurring Justice.
I concur in the result reached in this case because the winding up of the partnership affairs was not completed prior to Richard Fischer’s death. KRS 362.295. However, I do not regard the “purpose” statement in Article II of the amended partnership agreement, i.e., “the purchasing, leasing and selling of real estate at 8415 U.S. 42, Florence, Kentucky,” to be dispositive of whether the partnership was *107one of definite term or particular undertaking. KRS 362.300(l)(b).
Article X of the original partnership agreement provided: “This Agreement shall be binding and in force and the terms of this Partnership shall be for the period of ten (10) years from the date hereof.” The parties deleted this provision by strikethrough and initialed that deletion, indicating their intent not to limit the partnership to any definite term. The amended agreement did not contain a provision similar to original Article X or any other language limiting the term of the partnership. Thus, it is obvious the parties did not intend that the partnership be one of definite term. The only remaining issue is whether the partnership was a particular undertaking.
One can assume that a partnership would retain the right to sell, as well as purchase and lease, its real estate. While the majority opinion finds footnote 9 in Girard, Bank v. Haley, 460 Pa. 237, 332 A.2d 443, 447 n. 9 (1975), to be dispositive, that footnote describes a hypothetical partnership “formed for the purpose of developing and selling a particular tract of land” as being one for a particular undertaking. Girard Bank obviously was referring to the type of real estate development enterprise in which the primary purpose is to subdivide a tract of land into and sell, e.g., residential lots, so that when the last lot is sold, the particular undertaking for which the partnership was formed is concluded.
Here, the primary purpose of the enterprise was to generate income by purchasing and leasing the partnership property. “Leasing property, like many other trades or businesses, involves entering into a business relationship which may continue indefinitely; there is nothing ‘particular’ about it.” Id. at 447. Thus, KRS 362.300(l)(b) applied, and Richard Fischer had the power to unilaterally dissolve the partnership. However, the only immediate effect of a dissolution is that the partner ceases to be associated in the carrying on of as distinguished from the winding up of the business. KRS 362.290. Dissolution does not terminate the partnership; rather, the partnership continues until the winding up of the partnership affairs is completed. KRS 362.295.
[T]he term [“dissolution”] is employed as designating a change in the relation of the partners caused by any partner ceasing to be associated in the carrying on of the business. As thus used “dissolution” does not terminate the partnership, it merely ends the carrying on of the business in that partnership. The partnership continues until the winding up of partnership affairs is completed.
William Draper Lewis,1 The Uniform, Partnership Act, 24 Yale L.J. 617, 627 (1915). Here, the parties never even ceased carrying on the partnership business.
Since the winding up of D & T Enterprises was never completed, the partnership agreement and its buy-sell provision were still in effect at the time of Richard Fischer’s death. Cf. Blandau v. Rennick, 147 Or.App. 203, 935 P.2d 457, 462-63 (1997) (because partners’ dissolution agreement containing new buy-sell provision had not gone into effect prior to partner’s death, buy-sell provision in original partnership agreement remained in force and effect).
Accordingly, I concur in the result reached by the majority opinion, though not in its reasoning.

. Dean Lewis was one of the principal drafters of the Uniform Partnership Act.