Public-domain · open source
OpenJurist

47 App. D.C. 83

Green v. Reeves

U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit

Decided November 12, 1917

U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit · decided 1917-11-12

Hearing on an appeal by tbe plaintiff from a judgment of tbe Supreme Court of tbe District of Columbia, on a verdict directed by tbe court, in an action to recover money deposited under a contract for tbe purchase of real estate.

Relies on Catholic University of America v. Waggaman · 2 App. D.C. 298 - Ruppert v. Beavans

Good law ✅— No negative treatment on recordhow we know

Reversed · Decided 1917-11-12

How this case has been cited

Cited by 4 later decisions — most recently March 1990

2 federal appellate · 2 state decisions

10191719201930194019501960197019801990decided

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.

View the full empirical analysis of this case →

Mr. Chief Justice Smytii

¶1delivered the opinion of the Court:

¶2One party to a contract cannot terminate it without the conjsont of the other party, unless the latter has breached it (9 Cyc. 637), and whether he has done so is often a (question of fact. Green, by declaring that Reeves had failed to perform, and demanding the return of the deposit, did not abrogate the contract, since Reeves withheld his consent. The latter, as his letters show, .desired the contract to remain in existence in the expectation that he would be able to perfect the title. In his letter of July 29, 1913, he recognized the continued existence of the contract, and avowed his readiness to comply with its terms, which, meant that he was ready to convey a good title or return the deposit of $100 in the event that he could not do so. If Green’s carrse of action was barred by the Statute of Limitations, a question we do not decide, this letter removed the bar. A distinct and unequivocal acknowledgment by the debtor of the debt as a still subsisting personal obligation constitutes an implied promise to pay it, and this, “according to all the authorities, is all that is required to remove the statute in the case of a simple contract … .” (Ruppert v. Beavans, 2 App. D. C. 298-301; Catholic University v. Waggaman, 32 App. D. C. 307-316.)

¶3At the time the defendant wrote the letter of July 29 he was not able to convey a fee simple title which met the approval of the Columbia, company in accordance with his contract, as is shown by the certificate of that company; nor had ho at any time prior to the commencement of this action tendered the conveyance of such a title. AYe think that as a matter of law, under the facts disclosed by this record, a reasonable time within which to convey the title contracted for had elapsed before this suit was instituted, and the jury should have been instructed that the plaintiff was entitled to recover the $100, with interest thereon from the date on which the reasonable time for performance had expired. Reversed, with costs: and cause remanded, with directions to grant a new trial.

¶4B-eversed.

/47/appdc/83 · .json · Public domain