Rentch v. Long

Baktol, J., delivered the opinion of this Court. This case is not to be distinguished from Eichelberger vs. McCauley, 5 H. & J., 213 , in which it was decided that a contract for the delivery of wheat at a future period, which wheat, at the time of the contract, was in the stack unthreshed, was not within the Statute of Frauds. The ground upon which that decision was placed was that work and labor being necessary to pre ¹⁹⁸ pare the wheat for delivery, it was not a sale of goods, wares and merchandize within the meaning of the 17th section of the Statute. In the opinion of the Court, pronounced by Judge Earle, and concurred in by Chase, C. J., and Buchanan, Dorsey and Martin, it was said the “ distinction between mere contracts of sale of goods, and those contracts for the sale of goods where work and labor are to be bestowed on them previous to delivery, and subjects are blended together, some of which are not in the contemplation of the Statute, has too long prevailed to be at this day questioned.” Whatever opinion we might entertain on this question if it were presented to our consideration for the first time, we are not willing to disturb the rule established by Eichelberger vs. McCauley, and which has remained unquestioned in Maryland for so long a period.

That this case falls directly within the same 'principle is too clear to require much argument. Here, according to the evidence as found by the jury, the subject of the contract was two thousand bushels of corn, which at the time was in the field ungathered and unshucked, and which, by the contract, the plaintiff was entitled to have delivered to him at a future time gathered and shucked. The article was not at the time of the contract in a condition to be delivered, and according to the finding of the jury, which was warranted by the evidence, work and labor were necessary