Backenstoss v. Stahler's Administrators

• Decision Date: 01 January 1859
• Citation: 33 Pa. 251
• Parties: Backenstoss versus Stahler's Administrators.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

Page 251

33 Pa. 251

Backenstoss versus Stahler's Administrators.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

ERROR to the Common Pleas of Lehigh county.

COPYRIGHT MATERIAL OMITTED

Longnecker, Reeder, and Green, for the plaintiff in error.

Styles, Bridges, and A. E. Brown, for the defendants in error.

The opinion of the court was delivered by THOMPSON, J.

It is settled in this Commonwealth, that growing crops are personal property; subject, however, to pass with and as appurtenant to the realty, in case of conveyance, unless severed by reservation or exception therefrom: Bear v. Bitzer, 4 Harris 178; Wilkins v. Vashbinder, 7 Watts 379. Such was the rule of the common law, and uniformly held in England not to have been altered by the statute against frauds and perjuries. Amongst the numerous cases on this point see Sainsbury v. Matthews, 4 M. & W. 343; Evans v. Roberts, 5 B. & Cr. 829; Dunn v. Ferguson, Hayes 540 (Irish Rep).

The plaintiff in error was the purchaser of a tract of land from the defendants in error, administrators of the estate of Daniel Stahler, deceased, under an order of the Orphans' Court of Lehigh county, in proceedings in partition. At the sale, there was a reservation or exception of the grain by writing. The deed afterwards made, contained no reservation, and the vendee claims to hold it in the absence of such reservation in the deed, and by force of it, notwithstanding the exception or reservation in fact to the contrary. On the trial below, which was an action of trover to recover the value of the grain, the plaintiffs gave the written conditions in evidence, as well as offered parol evidence, to show that the grain was excepted from the sale of the land.

To the ruling of the court in regard to this matter, the 1st, 4th, 5th, and 9th exceptions apply, and will be considered together. It was offered to be proved by the plaintiffs, that at the commencement of, or during the sale, and before the property was struck down, the crier proclaimed that the grain in the ground was reserved, excepting every fourth bushel, in case the purchaser should choose to harvest it for that. This evidence was admitted under exception, and was, with the written conditions, referred to the jury, who found in favour of the plaintiffs. It was resisted on the ground that it contradicted not only the order of court but the conditions of sale. It will be remembered, that the order of court originated in proceedings in partition, and necessarily related exclusively to the realty. The grain, we have shown, was essentially personalty, subject to pass as incidental to the realty by a conveyance of the latter. If excepted or reserved, this operated as a severance, and it became thereafter, to all intents and purposes, personalty to which the order had no application. When the land was about to be sold, the grain crop rested on the contingency of whether it should be excepted from the sale by the administrators or not. If not reserved, it would pass by the conveyance as appurtenant to the realty, but if reserved or excepted, the vitality and scope of the order was in no way limited or impaired. It still operated to authorize the sale of what it described, viz., the realty and no more. The reservation did not change the denomination of the property in the crops, it only prevented their passage by the conveyance. In this view of the matter, it is apparent that the order was not affected or contradicted by the conditions of sale, or the oral announcement in regard to them.

Nor do we perceive the force of the objection, that the oral testimony contradicted the written conditions. At most, the announcement of the crier, which the jury have found was heard by the defendant, only declared what the written conditions defectively expressed. They either meant this, or there was such an ambiguity as might be explained by parol. In either event, the defendant would be bound. But we think the fair interpretation of the fourth clause of the condition of sale disclosed the same reservation as did the oral conditions announced by the crier, that the grain was excepted. It is as follows: "All straw from the winter grain now in the ground shall remain on the premises, except two ton." Here is a stipulated retrocession of the straw to the purchaser. It cannot well be doubted, but that this would be an insensible act if it had not been already reserved. That it could be reserved or excepted by a reservation or exception of the crop, will hardly be doubted either; hence, having been reserved by an exception of the grain, it became necessary, if it was an object to the purchaser to retain the straw on the farm, that it should be reserved to him out of the exception of it, and hence the stipulation that it should remain, excepting two ton. That this was so understood by the parties, is very apparent. The fourth clause of the conditions must be held to mean this, or it means nothing, which we are not at liberty to hold, if there be substance enough to disclose an intent, which we think there is. In this view of it, we think the court should have so interpreted the conditions of sale, and this would have rendered explanatory evidence unnecessary. Under these circumstances it is obvious the parol evidence did the defendant no harm, as the case was against him on this point without its aid.

But in regard to an interest, in a matter of a nature so temporary as growing crops, it is not necessary that the reservation should be by deed or in writing. It is not an interest in lands. "Growing crops of grain and vegetables, fructus industriales, being goods and chattels and not real estate, may be conveyed by a verbal contract, as they...