Thompson v. Winterbottom

Urner, J., delivered the opinion of the Court. In the spring of 1926 the appellees, who operate a canning factory, contracted in writing with William H. Thompson, one of the two appellants, to plant and cultivate for the appellees fifteen acres of land in tomatoes and to deliver the crop¡ when matured at a designated wharf and at a specified price per basket. The acreage mentioned in the agreement was part of a farm tenanted by Thompson and owned by Dr. Herman P. Copeland, the other appellant. It was stipulated in the agreement that Thompson should not raise tomatoes on the farm for any person other than the appellees.

Before contracting with the tenant, the agent of the appellees interviewed the landlord, who referred him to the tenant for any agreement which might be made on the subject. In answer to the agent’s inquiry as to how the checks in payment for the tomatoes should be drawn, Dr. Copeland said they could be made payable to Thompson. The farm had been orally leased to Thompson on a share rental. It had been occupied and cultivated by him on the same terms for two years prior to the time of the contract involved in this suit.

In each of the preceding years he had raised crops of tomatoes on the farm under his own contracts with canners, and the landlord had shared in the proceeds. After the execution of the tomato contract for the season of 1926, the tenant planted seventeen acres in tomatoes. When the crop was ripening, and part of it had been delivered to the appellees, Dr. 'Copeland claimed that ten acres of the tomato area had been planted and cultivated for his exclusive benefit under a general reservation of such a right in the terms of the tenancy. No intimation was given the appellees of the existence of that right when they contracted with the tenant by the landlord’s express permission.

There was nothing in the apparent conditions of the tenant’s occupancy to indicate that his lease was subject to the qualification since disclosed ⁵⁸³ or was in any respect different from the customary renting on shares. No other crop had been planted during the tenancy for the landlord’s separate use. The tomato acreage claimed by Dr. Copeland was planted and cultivated by the tenant; but they both state that the former provided the plants and paid for the work. It was not until the crop was maturing that the appellees were apprised of the landlord’s claim, although he had been promptly informed by the tenant that a contract- with the appellees had been executed. ‘In pursuance of his claim to the product from ten of the seventeen acres planted in tomatoes, Dr. Copeland, early in September, 1926, began to remove the crop being gathered from the ten acre patch and to have it delivered to another canner at a price higher than that which the appellees contracted to pay.

The pending suit was then brought for specific enforcement of the contract and for a receivership and an injunction in aid of that object, and from a decree affording the plaintiffs such relief, as to fifteen acres of the tomatoes, the defendants have appealed! The evidence proves the essential facts which have been stated, and they justly entitle the plaintiffs to- the relief granted. Upon the principle of equitable estoppel the appellants are precluded from successfully disputing the plaintiffs’ right to have their contract- with the tenant applied to fifteen acres of the tomatoes which he planted, cultivated, and harvested on the farm in his possession. The prejudice to the appellees from a failure to perform the contract is