Court Opinion

ID: 9674084
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 04:22:50.87922+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:16:25.536799
License: Public Domain

Shriver, J.
(dissenting).
I feel compelled to disagree with my learned colleagues as to the applicability of the Statute of Limitations of six years in this case.
*258To refuse to apply the statute under the facts presented here is to put a premium on delay in the assertion of rights, contrary to the spirit and purpose of the law.
Admittedly plaintiff operated the Murray farm, gratuitously, for about six years before Faye Murray’s death in March 1941, and no agreement as to compensation for services was entered into by defendant with him after the father’s death. Hence, there was good reason for the son’s assumption the plaintiff was continuing those services on the same basis that he rendered them for years, and defendant had a right to presume so unless notified to the contrary.
If .plaintiff changed the arrangement, tacitly, and without an understanding, so as to be entitled to recover remuneration for his services, honesty and fairness demanded that he make this known to defendant, the son and heir of his dear departed friend and benefactor.
To continue his course for eleven years, with never a word to defendant about his expectations, and with no word from defendant about it, should have put him on notice that defendant, probably, was under a misapprehension about it. In these circumstances good faith demanded that he make known his intentions.
This is especially true in view of the fact that, during much of the time in question, plaintiff was interested jointly with defendant in the farm activities where they maintained a partnership enterprise in race horses and other things, and there was a close and confidential relationship between them.
The ability to defend by showing lack of performance or the true value of services, was hampered or maybe *259lost to defendant after the lapse of years, whereas plaintiff, if it were his purpose to do so, might have preserved, remembered or manufactured evidence to sustain his claim.
The very purpose of the statute is to protect in such a case as this. In 17 R. C. L. 855, it is said:
"They (the Statutes of Limitations) were enacted to prevent frauds; to prevent parties from asserting rights after the lapse of time had destroyed or impaired the evidence which would show that such rights never existed, or had been satisfied, transferred, or extinguished, if they ever did exist.”
Significantly, plaintiff not only did not, during the whole eleven year period in question, mention the fact that he had changed the arrangement from that made with defendant’s father, but, in closing out the partnership with defendant, plaintiff gave him his note for $4,000, dated September 1, 1952.
On this note plaintiff made payments and requested extensions which were granted, with never a word about his claim of over twenty-five thousand dollars for services which services had already terminated before the note was given.
It was not until November 17, 1953 that he finally, through his attorney, made known the fact that he had been charging for his services through the years.
It is all too evident that Mr. Grissim, after Mr. Murray’s death, proceeded on the same basis that had characterized his dealings with the elder Murray. The idea of charging $200 per month, or any other sum, did not crystalize in his mind until after the eleven year period *260had terminated and his services had ended. His claim was an afterthought.
If we conld deal with the case on the preponderance of the evidence, or as one in equity, I do not believe plaintiff would be permitted to recover all. However, my learned colleagues have found that there is a jury question on the facts and have found sufficient evidence to support the verdict.
If we admit that this is a correct conclusion and that plaintiff’s course of conduct has not estopped him from maintaining his claim, yet I feel that morally and legally plaintiff, on the facts, was under the duty of asserting claim before the six year statute of limitations expired. To do otherwise was to knowingly perpetrate a wrong which the courts ought not to condone and reward.
Plaintiff finally, at the trial, asserted that his services were worth $200 a month for the whole eleven year period.
He himself puts it on a monthly basis.
I am confident a Court of equity would have denied a recovery, at least for services performed more than six years before claim was made. Under the authorities, I think a Court of law can do likewise and should do so.
In the old case of Wells v. Caldwell, 28 Tenn. 609 it was said:
“The statute of limitations applies to cases before justices of the peace, as it would to an action in a court of record upon a like case, and therefore, the bar to a suit for work and labor, upon which debt would lie, is six years, and debt will lie whether the contract be express or implied. (Now, the statute of. *261limitations applies in all oases to the canse, not the form of action.)”
“Donation Cannot be Changed Into Debt. If work be done as a donation to the party benefited, it cannot after-wards be recovered on as a debt. ’ ’
In 17 R. C. L. 787 in discussing Limitation of Actions as applied to “work, labor and services”, it is said:
“In case, however, of a hiring of services, without agreement as to term or amount of compensation, and in the absence of evidence of payments, it is declared that the law will not, under such circumstances, imply an agreement that compensation shall be postponed until the termination of the employment. ’ ’
The text further points out that, where one renders service upon a mere expectation of being remunerated as a matter of gratitude or generosity, there being no special contract as to duration of services or compensation, the statute applies from the end of each year.
In such cases the Courts give consideration to usage and custom appropriate to the kind of service in question.
I think the Court judicially knows that contracts for the conduct of farming operations are customarily from year to year.
In the case at bar, the contract had to be implied from the conduct, of the parties. Another implication on top of the first must then be added that the parties intended to postpone payment to the termination of employment, if it is to escape the effect of the statute. I do not think this.question was submitted to the jury.. It seems to have been decided as a matter of law by the Court.
*262Another proposition that is applicable here is, that the contract of employment, if one is implied or found to have existed, was severable or divisible, and, if so, the statute should be applied.
In Brockett v. Pipkin, 25 Tenn. App. 1, 149 S. W. (2d) 478. In an opinion by Judge Paw, the Court deals with the Statutes of Limitations and discusses the authorities at length in applying them to facts that are similar in several particulars to those in the case at bar.
The opinion states 25 Tenn. App. at pages 7-8, 149 S.W. (2d) at page 482:
“It is apparent from a consideration of the Chancellor’s findings and decree and the appellant’s third and fourth assignments of error that the determinative question for decision here is whether the contract in controversy was entire or divisible, for if it was a divisible, or severable, contract, the Chancellor did not err in holding that complainant’s action was barred by the statute of limitations;
“ ‘Where a contract is severable or divisible, breaches of its severable parts will give rise to separate causes of action accruing at different times, so that- the statute of limitations will begin to run at the time of each severable breach, although not until then.’ ”
The Court then quotes from 12 American Jurisprudence pages 871-3 where, among other things, it is said:
“ ‘As a general rule, a contract is entire when, by its terms, nature, and purpose, it contemplates that each and all of its parts are interdependent and *263common to one another and to the consideration, and is severable when, in its nature and purpose, it is susceptible of division and apportionment. (Emphasis ours.)
“ ‘Another test that has been suggested is the possibility or impossibility of a certain apportionment of benefits, according to the compensation in the contract, in case of part performance only.’ ”
The opinion then quotes with approval from Bradford & Carson v. Montgomery Furniture Co., 115 Tenn. 610, 92 S. W. 1104, 9 L. R. A., N. S., 979, Avhere it is said:
“ ‘ “The distintcion between an entire and sever-able contract is clearly stated in the books. In the former the consideration is entire on both sides. It does not, either by its terms or the implied intention of the parties, contemplate or admit of apportionment upon a partial failure on either side; and the complete fulfillment of the contract by either is required as a condition precedent to the fulfillment of any part of the contract by the other. A severable contract is a contract, the consideration of which by its terms is susceptible of division and apportionment. There is, in such contract, no entirety of consideration on either side constituting a eondiiton of the agreement; and neither party can claim more than an equivalent for the actual consideration on his part. Story on Con. secs. 21, 22.” ’ ” (Emphasis ours.)
In discussing the question of severability of a contract, the opinion, Brockett v. Pipkin, quotes with approval from 17 C. J. S., Contracts, secs. 331-336, pp. 785-971, in part as follows:
*264“ 'Another test that has been suggested is the possibility or imposibility of a certain apportionment of benefits, according to the compensation in the contract in case of part performance only. * * * The singleless or apportionability of the consideration appears tobe the principal test.’ ” (Emphasis ours.) The opinion continues :
“The principle stated in the above texts, that where the consideration of a contract is susceptible of apportionment, the contract is severable, has been approved by our Supreme Court.” (Emphasis ours.) Citing Bradford & Carson v. Montgomery Furniture Co., supra, and Coleman v. Hudson, 34 Tenn. 463.
In Ann. Cas. 1913A, 420 (note) it is said that where an attorney is retained and paid a salary by the month or year the statute of limitations runs against each month’s or year’s salary. Of course where he is hired for a single unit or specific task, it does not begin to run until the suit or task is finished.
The • text concludes :
“But where attorneys are regularly employed at a salary given for advice and legal superintendence and other services rendered from day to day, there is no reason why they should not stand upon the same footing as other salaried employees, so far as the statute of limitations is concerned.”
For the foregoing reasons, I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion in so far as it fails to apply the statute of limitations to bar plaintiff’s recovery for services performed more than six years before suit was filed.