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57 Miss. 97

Carson v. Percy

Mississippi Supreme Court

Decided October 15, 1879

Mississippi Supreme Court · decided 1879-10-15

<p>1. Specific Performance. Easement and servitude. Hardship.</p> <p>A grant, on valuable consideration., of the right perpetually to lay off new landings, as the river hank caves, to the exclusion of all others, on the water front of a large plantation, near a growing town, is not so unfair that equity will refuse to decree its specific performance.</p> <p>2. Same. Ambiguity. Right of election.</p> <p>The stipulation is sufficiently definite if it provides that the covenantor shall permit the covenantee, when the landing caves, to fix another, not to exceed four acres, at any point on the river front of the plantation, where the public interest may demand.,</p> <p>3. Same. Vendees of covenantor. Chancery jurisdiction.</p> <p>The covenantee can maintain a bill in chancery to enforce the contract against vendees, with notice, of parts of such plantation, who have collected rents from a new wharf, and laid off other ground for landing purposes.</p>

Decided 1879-10-15

Campbell, J.,

¶1delivered the opinion of the court.

¶2The bill presents a case cognizable in a Chancery Court, and sets forth a covenant obligatory on Roach and all who claim any part of the Batchelor’s Bend plantation under him, with notice of the covenant; and we do not discover any want of definiteness or fairness or consideration or any hardship in the contract at the time it was made, which should determine the court not to order its specific performance. It cannot be that they who acquired a portion of the Batchelor’s Bend plantation, after the covenant with the complainant, and with notice of his covenanted right to the perpetual enjoyment of the exclusive control of a landing on the river front of the plantation, shall be permitted to enjoy the fruit of what was secured to the complainant. The case made by the bill entitles the complainant to relief; and, without anticipating *102the particular manner in which it may be granted, we reverse the decree, overrule the demurrer, and remand the cause, with leave to the defendants to answer the bill within thirty days after the mandate herein shall have been filed in the court below.

¶3 Decree accordingly.

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