Bell v. Hill Bros. Const. Co., Inc.

419 So. 2d 575, 34 U.C.C. Rep. Serv. (West) 1516, 1982 Miss. LEXIS 2142
CourtMississippi Supreme Court
DecidedSeptember 8, 1982
Docket53364
StatusPublished
Cited by5 cases

This text of 419 So. 2d 575 (Bell v. Hill Bros. Const. Co., Inc.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Mississippi Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Bell v. Hill Bros. Const. Co., Inc., 419 So. 2d 575, 34 U.C.C. Rep. Serv. (West) 1516, 1982 Miss. LEXIS 2142 (Mich. 1982).

Opinion

419 So.2d 575 (1982)

Ames BELL, Appellant,
v.
HILL BROTHERS CONSTRUCTION CO., INC., Appellee.

No. 53364.

Supreme Court of Mississippi.

September 8, 1982.

Talmadge D. Littlejohn, New Albany, for appellant.

Smith, Elliott & Fortier, Robert W. Elliott, Ripley, for appellee.

Before SUGG, P.J., and HAWKINS and PRATHER, JJ.

*576 SUGG, Presiding Justice, for the Court:

This appeal is from an order of the Circuit Court of Union County sustaining three of appellee's pleas in bar and dismissing appellant's declaration. We reverse and remand for a trial on the merits.

Appellant alleged in his declaration that he and appellee entered into a written contract on September 10, 1979 whereby appellee agreed to purchase approximately 14,556 cubic yards of borrow material (fill soil) from appellant's land and to place approximately 14,958 cubic yards of waste material on appellant's land. The contract provided that appellee would pay appellant $1,000 for the borrow material to be removed from appellant's land, and that appellee would pay appellant $5,000 damages for the privilege of placing waste material on appellant's land, such waste material to be spread and leveled so as to allow natural drainage on appellant's land. The written contract is attached as Appendix A to this opinion.

Appellant then alleged that, subsequent to the written contract, he and appellant entered into an oral agreement for the purchase by appellee of additional borrow material to be removed by appellee from appellant's land. Appellant alleged that appellee agreed to pay twenty cents per cubic yard for the additional 35,944 cubic yards of borrow material removed from appellant's land for a total contract price of $7,188.80.

Appellant further alleged that he had performed all of the conditions of the oral agreement by allowing appellee to remove 35,944 cubic yards of borrow material in accordance with the oral agreement, but that appellee had breached the agreement by failing to pay the sum of $7,188.80.

Appellee answered and filed several pleas in bar. Without hearing evidence, the trial judge sustained the pleas in bar, and with respect to the plea of accord and satisfaction held:

[T]he court is of the opinion that the plea is well taken, and that as the contract is drawn, and that it is not ambiguous or uncertain as to the statements thereof. It is set forth in the alternative that the payment was for approximately 14,556 cubic yards, or as required by the Mississippi State Highway Department and the payment therefore was in the sum of $1,000.00 and was to be removed from the approximately four acres, or at least that was the amount of real property that was involved herein, and that there was a payment for damages on the spreading of waste material for approximately 14,958 cubic yards ...

The trial judge erred in holding that the plea of accord and satisfaction barred the action because the declaration clearly alleged that the suit was based on a separate oral agreement entered into subsequent to the written contract. Whether such oral agreement was entered into between the parties is a question to be decided by a jury after hearing evidence from both parties.

The trial judge also held that the written contract could not be altered by parol evidence under the provisions of section 75-2-202 Mississippi Code Annotated (1972).

Terms with respect to which the confirmatory memoranda of the parties agree or which are otherwise set forth in a writing intended by the parties as a final expression of their agreement with respect to such terms as are included therein may not be contradicted by evidence of any prior agreement or of a contemporaneous oral agreement but may be explained or supplemented
(a) by course of dealing or usage of trade (Section 1-205) [§ 75-1-205] or by course of performance (Section 2-208) [§ 75-2-208];
(b) by evidence of consistent additional terms unless the court finds the writing to have been intended also as a complete and exclusive statement of the terms of the agreement.

In reaching this conclusion the trial judge relied on Ralston Purina Co. v. Rooker, 346 So.2d 901 (Miss. 1977) and Noble v. Logan-Dees Chevrolet-Buick, Inc., 293 So.2d 14 (Miss. 1974). Those cases are not applicable because in both cases an effort was *577 made to vary the terms of written contracts by oral agreements claimed to have been entered into before the written contracts were executed. In the case at bar appellant is not attempting to vary the terms of a written contract by a previous or contemporaneous or oral agreement, but specifically alleged that the oral agreement was entered into subsequent to the written contract. Appellant brought suit on a separate, independent oral contract; therefore, the trial judge erred in holding that the suit was an effort to amend a written contract by a previous or contemporaneous parol agreement.

The trial judge also found that the suit was barred by the statute of frauds under section 75-2-201 Mississippi Code Annotated (1972) (Revised 1981). This statute provides that a contract for the sale of goods for the price of $500 or more is not enforceable by way of action or defense unless there is some writing sufficient to indicate that a contract for sale has been made between the parties and signed by the party against whom enforcement is sought. "Goods" are defined in section 75-2-105 Mississippi Code Annotated (1972) (Revised 1981) as follows:

(1) "Goods" means all things (including specially manufactured goods) which are movable at the time of identification to the contract for sale other than the money in which the price is to be paid, investment securities (Chapter 8) and things in action. "Goods" also includes the unborn young of animals and growing crops and other identified things attached to realty as described in the section on goods to be severed from realty (Section 2-107) [§ 75-2-107].

Section 75-2-107 Mississippi Code Annotated (1972) (Rev. 1981) provides in part as follows:

(1) A contract for the sale of minerals or the like (including oil and gas) or a structure or its materials to be removed from realty is a contract for the sale of goods within this chapter if they are to be severed by the seller but until severance a purported present sale thereof which is not effective as a transfer of an interest in land is effective only as a contract to sell.

The official comment on § 2-107(1) by the National Conference of Commissioners on Uniform State Laws follows:

1. Subsection (1). Notice that this subsection applies only if the minerals or structures "are to be severed by the seller". If the buyer is to sever, such transactions are considered contracts affecting land and all problems of the Statute of Frauds and of the recording of land rights apply to them. Therefore, the Statute of Frauds section of this Article does not apply to such contracts though they must conform to the Statute of Frauds affecting the transfer of interests in land. [West's Selected Commercial Statutes at 61 (1978)]

We have no Mississippi cases construing this section of the Uniform Commercial Code but two recent cases from other jurisdictions have adopted the official comment quoted above. Tousley-Bixler Const. v. Colgate Enterprises, 429 N.E.2d 979 (Ind. 1982); DeLuca v. C.W. Blakeslee & Sons, Inc.,

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Bluebook (online)
419 So. 2d 575, 34 U.C.C. Rep. Serv. (West) 1516, 1982 Miss. LEXIS 2142, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/bell-v-hill-bros-const-co-inc-miss-1982.