Greene v. First Parish in Malden
Greene v. First Parish in Malden
Opinion of the Court
afterward drew up the opinion of the Court. We cannot find any safe ground to support this action upon, for the repairs of the parish-house. The sum appropriated for that purpose in 1815, was exhausted, and the committee employed to expend the money, expressly declined making further repairs without new authority.
The plaintiff therefore proceeded in the repairs and expenditures taking upon himself the risk of being indemnified by the parish, if they should think fit to reimburse him.
This agreement was made conclusively by a vote of the par
The pulpit had been vacated by the plaintiff in July 1827, and from October of that year, had been supplied by a com mittee of the parish ; so that the pastoral relation was de facto, by mutual consent, dissolved long before the vote was passed to pay the account of repairs. At the time then of the vote of the parish, to pay the account, there was no indebtedness ; there had been no request to make the repairs, and they were made on an estate of which the plaintiff was seised in fee, and of which he was in the enjoyment, and which he continued to enjoy for twelve years, and finally which he voluntarily surrendered, without any stipulation or request for payment for the repairs. The vote then, if considered as a promise to pay, was nugatory and unauthorized, the parish having no right to incur debts founded on no beneficial equivalent. It was an act of generosity, or rather an effort to be generous which failed before it was executed ; and the law cannot aid the plaintiff to enforce it.
We perceive among the items of the account, charges for certain conveniences, which are not necessarily part of the freehold, and which the plaintiff therefore has a right to remove. We recommend a reasonable allowance for these, in order to avoid another suit. We refer particularly to the window-blinds and stove.
See Revised Stat. c. 20, § 18."
See Bulkley v. London, 2 Connect. R. 404 ; Chaffee v. Thomas, 7 Cowen, 858; Lonsdale v. Brown, 4 Wash. Circ. C. R. 148; Parker v. Crane, 6 Wendell, 647; Leland v. Douglass, 1 Wendell, 492; Goldsby v. Robertson, 1 Blackford, 247.
An entire promise founded partly on a past and executed consideration, and partly on an executory consideration, is supported by the executory consideration. Loomis v. Newhall, 15 Pick. 159; Andrews v. Ives, 3 Connect. R. 368.
See Doty v. Wilson, 14 Johns. R. 378; Oatfield v. Waring, 14 Johns. R. 188; Hicks v. Burnham, 10 Johns. R. 243; Stoever v. Stoever, 9 Serg. & Rawle, 434.
See 4 Burn’s Eccl. Law. (7th ed.) 301; Chitty on Contr. (4th Am. ed.) 286,287; Gray v. Holdship, 17 Serg. &Rawle, 415, per Smith J.; Gaffield v. Hapgood, 17 Pick. 192.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- Aaron Greene versus The First Parish in Malden
- Status
- Published