Mullins v. Taylor

• Decision Date: 02 July 1923
• Docket Number: 22794
• Citation: 132 Miss. 551,97 So. 5
• Court: Mississippi Supreme Court
• Parties: MULLINS v. TAYLOR

97 So. 5

132 Miss. 551

MULLINS v. TAYLOR

No. 22794

Supreme Court of Mississippi

July 2, 1923

In Banc., January 1, 1920

EQUITY. Will not aid employer, breaching contract to discharge employee who was without fault.

Where a plantation owner employed a person for a year to man age a plantation, and breaches the contract without fault of the employee, and undertakes to discharge him, and seeks the aid of equity by injunction to make her act effective, equity will refuse aid on the principle of the maxim, "He who comes into equity must come with clean hands."

HON. E N. THOMAS, Chancellor.

APPEAL from chancery court of Humphreys county, HON. E. N. THOMAS Chancellor.

Suit by Mrs. W. S. Mullins against E. C. Taylor. From a decree for defendant, plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

Judgment affirmed.

Mortimer & Sykes, for appellant.

This case involves a question of far-reaching importance, and one vital to any agricultural country, and especially to our Delta country where nearly all of the plantations have managers on them; which is, can any employer or master terminate the agency or discharge his servant at will, or can the servant or agent force his master or principal to retain him in his employ against his (the master's or principal's) will?

Our position is that the principal can revoke the agency at any time he desires, and the master can discharge his servant at any time he desires, with or without cause. If he discharges him with cause, he does so without liability but if he discharges him without cause, he is liable to the agent or servant for the damages sustained by the latter by virtue thereof. See 21 R. C. L., section 8, page 823.

There is a distinction in law between the master's and principal's power to discharge the servant, or revoke the agency, and his right to do so. 31 Cyc., par. 2, page 1300 citing authorities; 26 Cyc., page 972; 18 R. C. L., sec. 21, page 510, citing Derosia v. Ferland (Vt.); 28 L. R. A. (N. S.) 577.

If, therefore, Mrs. Mullins, under the contract, could not force Taylor to stay in her employ against his will, then certainly Taylor could not, under the contract, force Mrs. Mullins to retain him in her employ against her will. Adair v. United States, 208 U.S. 161, at pages 174 and 175; 52 L.Ed. 436, 442, and 443; Re Opinion of Justices (Mass.); L. R. A. 1917 B., 1119; Sims v. Lumber Company, 51 So. 460.

When the motion to dissolve the injunction came on for hearing before the court, the court saw fit not only to decide that issue, but also decided the case on its merits, which we contend was error, because, in the first place, the learned Chancellor had no right to try the case on its merits at a hearing on a motion to dissolve the injunction, and, in the second place, he had no right to allow Taylor, at that time, his salary for November and December, because Mrs. Mullins was entitled to have his damages in that particular, diminished by any sums which he might make during those two months, and his damage in that regard could not have been determined until some time subsequent to December 31st. Carley v. Reeves, 107 Miss. 67, 64 So. 964; Birdsong v. Ellis, 62 Miss. 418; Hunt v. Crayne, 33 Miss. 669; Ricard v. Margin, 27 Miss. 305; 105 U.S. 1117; 178 U.S. 953; Railway Company v. Echols, 54 Miss. 264.

Mortimer & Sykes, for appellant, in response to questions propounded by the court.

The court desires additional briefs in this case addressed to the following propositions:

1. Assuming that the appellant discharged the appellee without just cause, thereby wrongfully terminating the contract, has equity power to aid her in getting the possession of the property and enjoining the defendant from further carrying out the contract?

2. Is the contract in the present case a contract for personal services within the meaning of that term?

3. Does the contract giving the defendant the right to work the two-mule crop upon the premises give him an interest within the meaning of the rule that a principal cannot discharge an agent where the agent's contract is coupled with an interest?

In answer to the first question asked by the court, the authorities are all agreed that a principal has the power to revoke the agency, save in exceptional cases, one of them being where the power is coupled with an interest, which is covered hereinafter below. Whether or not he has the right depends on the facts of the case, and if the revocation is wrongful, he is answerable in damages to the agent. Therefore, appellant had the power to terminate the agency. She did terminate it, and, consequently, the agency was ended. Thereafter, the agent was without further authority to act for her, and had he attempted to contract any liability, or otherwise for which she would have been responsible during the existence of the agency, she would not, after the revocation, have been liable. The agency was a thing past and gone. It was ended, and the agent was shorn of his power and authority.

This was not an action brought to terminate the agency, for that was not necessary. The agency was terminable at will and had been terminated. It was an action brought by this appellant to get the immediate possession of her premises, something to which she held the legal title and to which she was entitled. The appellee, after the revocation of his agency, refused to yield her the possession of her own property. He then and there became a trespasser and an active trespasser, at that.

In conclusion on this point, we reiterate that the agency had been terminated. This was an action concerning the possession of her property. In her bill she recognized that if the court should hold that the agent was wrongfully discharged, he was entitled to damages, and in her bill she offered to do equity and pay him whatever damage the court said he had sustained. This was the utmost she, or anyone else, could do.

In order to answer questions two and three of the court, it is necessary to know thoroughly just exactly what is meant by a power coupled with an interest. The leading case on this subject is Hunt v. Rousmanier, 8 Wheat. 204, 5 L.Ed. 597. The case of McKellops v. Dewitz (Okla.), 52 L. R. A. (N. S.) 255, sets out the decision in that case on this subject practically in full and is also a splendid case with reference to this question.

As to this character of agency, the rule is announced by Mr. Mechem in his work on Agency, section 204, 31 Cyc., pages 1294 and 1301, both inclusive; 21 R. C. L., sec. 62, page 889; Todd v. Superior Court (Cal. ), 7 A. L. R. 938 and note; 21 R. C. L., page 824, sec. 8.

The prayer of the bill was for "a mandatory injunction to restrain defendant from further interfering in the management or control of the said plantation, commissary, commissary books, labor, and personal property, and that he remove from the residence thereon within thirty days." The injunction writ was as follows:

"Now, therefore, you are hereby commanded and enjoined until further order of this court, from further interfering in the management and control of the premises described in the said original bill . . . commissary, commissary books, labor, and personal property on said plantation, and that you remove therefrom in thirty days from the residence on said plantation."

Therefore, it is patent that everything he was enjoined from doing was interfering in the management and control of said place.

Everett & Forman and N.W. Sumrall, for appellee.

This case should be affirmed on two theories. First, that a written contract for a specified period, to-wit: the year 1921, had been entered into between the parties and could not thereafter be ignored or terminated without just cause before the expiration of the contract; and, second, the parties occupied the relation of landlord and tenant, and the tenancy could not be determined without two months' written notice, as provided by section 2882, Code of 1906; Sec. 2380, Hemingway's Code. As to the first proposition, we submit that the mere idea of appellant that the crop for 1921 was not what it should be was no ground for the cancellation of the contract of employment with appellee. We recognize the principle that, where a contract is entered into for a specified time, either party may cancel the same where the circumstances justify it, as where the employee was constantly under the influence of intoxicating liquors, as laid down in Willis v. Lowrey, 101 Miss. 118, or where the employer has certain fixed rules with reference to the conduct of his business, and the employee will not abide by such rules, as is laid down in Cauley v. Rivers, 107 Miss. 67. In this case, however, there are no broken rules; there is no misconduct calling for the discharge of Taylor; and the record discloses nothing on which Mrs. Mullins could base her idea of dissatisfaction. Under the contract above set out, Taylor had the exclusive management of the place for the year 1921, and could not, without just cause, be removed from the place until the expiration of this term.

As to the second proposition, we submit that in addition to Taylor being the manager under a contract, he was a tenant, and occupied the same relation to his landlord, by the specific terms of the contract of employment, as did any other tenant on the place; that is a tenant for the year 1921. Schlicht v. Callicott, 76 Miss. 487; Alexander v. Postal Zeigler, 84 Miss. 560.

Everett & Forman, for appellee, in response to the questions propounded by the court.

We say, in answer to this first question, that equity has no power to aid in obtaining possession by injunctive relief for three reasons: (a) The right of possession is a question of fact for a jury and the defendant cannot be deprived of that constitutional right by an...