Continental & Commercial Trust & Savings Bank v. McCarty
Opinion of the Court
(after stating the facts as above). The single question presented by the demurrer is whether a cause of suit has arisen in favor of the appellant. The contract provides that the appellee shall pay on November 1, 1909, the first deferred payment and .interest on all deferred payments from April 1, 1909, but it proceeds
it is not disputed that the irrigation season in the locality of the appellee’s lands is the period between April 1st and November 1st. The contract, when all its terms are considered, makes it clear that, if water for irrigation is not available at the beginning of the first irrigation season, no payment either of principal or interest is to be made until the end of the next ensuing season at the beginning of which the water shall be available for use. Counsel for the appellant argue that such a construction is unreasonable and unjust; that the water might be available on the 2d of April, 1909, and the appellee might have all the benefit thereof for the season, and yet, under tile construction so adopted, no compensation could be collected for the use thereof. But dial argument does not meet the case presented by the bill. It is not therein alleged that the water was available for substantially the whole of the irrigation season of 1909. It is alleged that it was available on May 14th. The use of the water from May 14th to the end of the season may or may not have been of considerable value to the appel-lee. Of that we need not inquire. The parties saw fit to contract for the use of the water for the irrigation season as a whole. They made clear their intention that if the use of the water was delayed until after the beginning of the first irrigation season, so that the appellee could not receive substantially wliat he contracted for for that season, all payments of principal and interest should be advanced one year. The construction contended for by the appellant that interest began to run from May 14th, the day when the water was in fact available, would involve the unjust and unreasonable conclusion that if the water had been furnished on the 1st of October, which was practically at the end of the irrigation season, interest would have run from that date.
The contention is made that the delay in furnishing the water for the irrigation season of 1909 cannot affect the right of the appellant
The decree is affirmed.
Reference
- Full Case Name
- CONTINENTAL & COMMERCIAL TRUST & SAVINGS BANK v. McCARTY
- Status
- Published