Horace Gray

“ It is difficult to understand how the duration of the patent and the duration of the boat differed from one another in their relation to the performance or the determination of the contract; or how a contract to use an aid to navigation upon a boat so long as she shall last can be distinguished in principle from a contract to support a man so long as he shall live, which has been often decided, and is generally admitted, not to be within the statute of frauds. ”

“ Lord Esher, M. R., thought the true doctrine on the subject was that laid down by Chief Justice Tindal in the passage above quoted from Souch v. Strawbridge. Lord Justice Lindley said: 'The provisions of the statute have been construed in a series of decisions from which we cannot depart. The effect of these decisions is that, if the contract can by possibility be performed within the year, the statute does not apply.' Lord Justice Bowen said: 'There has been a decision which for 200 years has been accepted as the leading case on the subject. ”

“ This case has been so fully and ably argued, and the construction of this clause of the statute of frauds has so seldom come before this court, that it will be useful, before considering the particular contract now in question, to refer to some of the principal decisions upon the subject in the courts of England, and of the several states. ”