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126 Mass. 366

Wallis v. Bardwell

Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court · decided 1879-03-03

Contract on an account annexed for labor and materials furnished in the repair of a building upon real estate belonging to the defendants. Answer, a general denial.

Relies on Thacher v. Dinsmore · Simmons v. Almy

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Decided 1879-03-03

How this case has been cited

Cited by 9 later decisions — most recently September 1944

9 state decisions

3018791880189019001910192019301940decided

Later decisions citing this case, by decade. The current decade is in progress, and our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so the latest bars are undercounted — not a real decline.

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Colt, J.

¶1The evidence offered was properly rejected, as immaterial. The rule is, that a guardian can make no contract binding upon the ward, or upon his estate. The guardian has only the control and management of the ward’s estate, with no title to it; a power not coupled with an interest. He may make contracts in his own name, but they only bind himself; and the ward does not become a party to them after the death or discharge of the guardian. Thacher v. Dinsmore, 5 Mass. 299. Hicks v. Chapman, 10 Allen, 463. Simmons v. Almy, 100 Mass. 239.

¶2The plaintiffs bring themselves within no exception to the rule. The contract here relied on, moreover, is one which, inde*367pendently of the rule, would not be binding on the minors, if made by them; for repairs on a dwelling-house are not necessar ries in the technical sense of the word. Tupper v. Cadwell, 12 Met. 559.

¶3Exceptions overruled.

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